Design and operational characteristics of a PV 001 image tube incorporated with EB CCD readout

A luminescence screen was replaced with a thinned, backside-illuminated, electron bombarded (EB) CCD in a well-known PV 001 streak/shutter image converter tube. The tube was mounted into an experimental camera prototype for measurement of its main technical characteristics. Under EB CCD readout operation in a free-scanning, slow-speed mode, the overall system spatial resolution was higher than 40 lp/mm at 10% MTF, and the linear part of the light transfer function was not less than 130. In streak mode the PV 001/EB CCD image tube exhibited threshold sensitivity of not less than 10-10 J/cm2 when recording 40 ps, 850 nm radiation pulses from a semiconductor laser. The preliminary results indicate that the PV 001/EB CCD image tube has quite a stable infrared sensitivity of its S1 photocathode.