A Linear Dynamic Range Receiver With Timing Discrimination for Pulsed TOF Imaging LADAR Application

This paper presents a linear and wide dynamic range (DR) receiver for pulsed time-of-flight imaging laser detection and ranging application, which can capture the pulsed echo intensity. The alternative leading edge timing discrimination scheme with two threshold voltages by differential voltage shift is utilized to compensate the walk error, and thus accurately obtain timing information. The proposed receiver was implemented and fabricated in a 0.18-<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\mu \text{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> CMOS technology. The receiver achieves a high differential transimpedance gain of 106 dB<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\Omega $ </tex-math></inline-formula>, a wide differential output swing of about 1.8 V, an input-referred noise current of 4.55 pA/Hz^0.5 and a minimum detectable signal of about <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$0.28~\mu $ </tex-math></inline-formula>Arms at SNR = 5, leading to a linear DR of 66 dB with a 3.3-V power supply. The area of the receiver chip is equal to <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$0.95\times0.95$ </tex-math></inline-formula> mm².