Regulated Common-Gate Transimpedance Amplifier Designed to Operate With a Silicon Photo-Multiplier at the Input

A transimpedance amplifier (TIA) in the front-end of a radiation detector is required to convert the current pulse produced by a light-detector to a voltage pulse with amplitude and shape suitable for the subsequent processing. We consider in this paper the specifications of a positron emission tomography (PET) scanner for medical imaging. The conventional approach is to use an avalanche photo-diode (APD) as the light-detector and a feedback TIA. We point out here that, when the APD is replaced by the more recent silicon photo-multiplier (SiPM), a feedback TIA is not suitable, and we propose the use of a regulated common-gate (RC-G) TIA. We derive the transimpedance function of the RC-G TIA considering the parasitic capacitances that have a dominant effect on the pulse shaping. We use the result obtained to establish TIA design guidelines, and we show that these should be different with an APD and with a SiPM at the input. We identify the dominant noise source in the RC-G TIA, and we derive a closed form equation for the output noise rms voltage. A prototype TIA was designed for UMC 130 nm CMOS technology. We present simulation and experimental results that confirm that the RC-G circuit is suitable for implementation of the TIAs in the front-end of a PET scanner using SiPMs at the input.