LAUSR

Radiation-hardened image sensors have been developed over the last few decades. Most of these studies have examined sensor properties before and after radiation, but few have described images during radiation. We have developed a new type of radiation-hardened pixel and integrated it into a 1.3-Mpixel, 18-bit digital CMOS image sensor. The pixel area incorporates several types of variation, and the sensor was analyzed during 60Co gamma-ray radiation at a rate above 1 kGy/h; the total ionizing dose (TID) was as high as 200 kGy. As a result, one type of pixel showed a negligibly small dark-level increase over the entire period. Conversely, the organic color filters degraded, even at a TID as low as 10 kGy.