Pulsed time‐of‐flight pixel with on‐chip 20 klux background light suppression in standard CMOS technology

Abstract

Summary A novel time‐of‐flight pixel designed in 0.18‐ μ m standard CMOS technology with an indirect pulsed technique is presented. This design is capable of operating in ambients with high levels of background light, since a novel in‐pixel background suppression circuit makes it robust up to 20 klux of ambient light. In addition to this, the pixel incorporates an adaptive number of accumulations circuit that selects the optimum number of accumulations for each situation at pixel level, avoiding saturation even under high illumination conditions.