Triple wavelength superspectral camera focal-plane array (SUPERCAMERA)

光学成像可能是当今使用的最重要的传感器形式。它广泛用于消费、医疗、商业和国防技术。过去20年来最引人注目的发展是使用互补金属氧化物半导体（CMOS）技术的数字成像的出现。由于CMOS是可扩展的，相机技术受益于晶体管尺寸的摩尔定律减小，因此现在可以以50英镑的价格购买10兆像素以上的相机。同样的好处也开始出现在其他成像市场-最明显的是在红外成像，64 x64像素的热成像相机可以买到低于1000英镑。远红外（FIR），或太赫兹，成像现在正在成为一个重要的模式与应用到生物医学和安全成像，但早期的成像阵列仍然只有几个像素的研究思路和原型，我们目前正在调查。还没有尝试将三个不同波长的传感器同轴地集成到同一芯片上。传感器融合已经很普遍，来自传统可见光和中红外（MIR）传感器的图像数据被覆盖，以提供更具揭示性和数据丰富的可视化。图像融合允许识别差异并进行比较处理。我们的目标是制造一种“超光谱”成像芯片。通过超光谱，我们指的是在广泛不同的波段中的检测，而不是在一个波段内的许多波长的区分-例如可见波段中的红色，绿色和蓝色。我们将以“超过摩尔”微电子技术为平台。通过这样做，我们将利用广泛可用的低成本CMOS来构建可以在英国开发和利用的新的经济上重要的技术。要使这种技术成为可能，还需要克服相当多的挑战。我们将混合两个半导体系统，以集成用于可见光和MIR检测的高效光电二极管传感器。我们将集成热辐射传感的FIR成像。我们将使用设计和封装技术进行热隔离，并优化每种传感器类型的性能。我们将使用混合超材料和表面等离子体共振技术来优化波长识别，从而实现物理上较大的（即FIR）传感器与可见光和MIR传感器的垂直堆叠。我们最终希望展示世界上第一台超光谱相机。

Optical imaging is perhaps the single most important sensor modality in use today. Its use is widespread in consumer, medical, commercial and defence technologies. The most striking development of the last 20 years has been the emergence of digital imaging using complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology. Because CMOS is scalable, camera technology has benefited from Moore's law reduction in transistor size so that it is now possible to buy cameras with more than 10 MegaPixels for £50. The same benefits are beginning to emerge in other imaging markets - most notably in infrared imaging where 64x64 pixel thermal cameras can be bought for under £1000. Far infrared (FIR), or terahertz, imaging is now emerging as a vital modality with application to biomedical and security imaging, but early imaging arrays are still only few pixel research ideas and prototypes that we are currently investigating. There has been no attempt to integrate the three different wavelength sensors coaxially on to the same chip. Sensor fusion is already widespread whereby image data from traditional visible and mid infrared (MIR) sensors is overlaid to provide a more revealing and data rich visualisation. Image fusion permits discrepancies to be identified and comparative processing to be performed. Our aim is to create a "superspectral" imaging chip. By superspectral we mean detection in widely different bands, as opposed to the discrimination of many wavelengths inside a band - e.g. red, green and blue in the visible band. We will use "More than Moore" microelectronic technology as a platform. By doing so, we will leverage widely available low-cost CMOS to build new and economically significant technologies that can be developed and exploited in the UK. There are considerable challenges to be overcome to make such technology possible. We will hybridise two semiconductor systems to integrate efficient photodiode sensors for visible and MIR detection. We will integrate bolometric sensing for FIR imaging. We will use design and packaging technologies for thermal isolation and to optimise the performance of each sensor type. We will use hybridised metamaterial and surface plasmon resonance technologies to optimise wavelength discrimination allowing vertical stacking of physically large (i.e. FIR) sensors with visible and MIR sensors.We ultimate want to demonstrate the world's first ever super-spectral camera.