Low Light Level Camera For Raman Spectroscopy

描述（由申请人提供）：拉曼光谱是用于疾病实时诊断和活组织原位评价的潜在重要临床工具。然而，用于组织评估的拉曼光谱的应用受到了强组织荧光的限制，强组织荧光常常使极弱的拉曼信号变弱。该提议的目标是开发一种红外拉曼光谱系统，其激发激光波长延伸超过1000 nm，其中组织荧光被完全抑制，并且窄线宽二极管激光器，例如为光通信应用开发的那些DFB激光器，是容易获得的。提出了一种微光红外相机作为拉曼光谱系统的核心部件。它利用了小型化和单片集成版本的成熟的固态检测器技术，并预计能够检测每个像素上的毫微微瓦（即10^（-15）瓦）的光信号。由于现代半导体集成技术和最近在纳米材料方面的突破，这种灵敏度比标准的硅基CCD探测器好几个数量级，并且与当前的图像增强管相当。拟议的微光相机覆盖900 nm - 1650 nm光谱范围。该器件设计用于高灵敏度，增益为1，000。它的读出噪声小到1电子/像素/帧，低于目前的非增强系统。15，000线性像素的高分辨率导致1 A光谱分辨率。它在1 MHz时的高速工作允许1微秒的选通时间。在批量生产时，拟议相机的制造成本为500美元。所提出的低噪声相机不是基于对现有解决方案的渐进式改进，而是基于B&W TEK开发的颠覆性技术平台，将光电检测器阵列中的低噪声高速检测和低噪声并行放大与CCD/CMOS读出电子器件中的高速串行化和读出分离，其中高增益低噪声并行放大作为两个过程之间的噪声隔离缓冲器。这一切都是由于最近纳米技术的蓬勃发展-核心放大器利用60纳米的放大层和30纳米的表面氧化层，以实现低噪声高灵敏度检测和放大。因此，所提出的微光相机有望使红外拉曼光谱仪具有更高的灵敏度和更快的响应时间，从而更有效地分析生物样品并更准确地帮助诊断疾病。 公共卫生相关性：所提出的微光红外相机是一种使能技术，用于超过1000 nm的红外拉曼光谱，这是一种潜在的重要的临床工具，用于实时诊断疾病和活体组织的原位评估。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Raman spectroscopy is a potentially important clinical tool for real-time diagnosis of diseases and in situ evaluation of living tissues. However, the application of Raman spectroscopy for tissue evaluation has been limited by the strong tissue fluorescence that often overwhelms the extremely weak Raman signal. The goal of this proposal is to develop an infrared Raman spectroscopy system with its excitation laser wavelength extending beyond 1000 nm, where the tissue fluorescence is completely suppressed and narrow line width diode lasers, such as those DFB lasers developed for optical communication applications, are readily available. A low-light-level infrared camera is proposed as the core component of the Raman spectroscopy system. It utilizes the miniaturized and monolithically integrated version of a proven solid-state detector technology, and is expected to be able to detect femto-Watts (namely, 10^(-15) Watt) of optical signal on each pixel. This sensitivity is several orders of magnitude better than standard silicon based CCD detectors and is comparable to the current image intensifying tubes, thanks to modern semiconductor integration techniques and recent breakthroughs in nano-materials. The proposed low-light-level camera covers 900 nm - 1650 nm spectral range. It is designed for high sensitivity with gain of 1,000. Its readout noise is as small as 1 electron/pixel/frame, lower than the current non-intensified systems. The high resolution of 15,000 linear pixels leads to 1 A spectral resolution. Its high speed of operation at 1 MHz allows 1 micro-second gating time. At volume production, the manufacturing cost of the proposed camera is $500. Based not on incremental improvements over existing solutions, but on a disruptive technology platform developed at B&W TEK, the proposed low-noise camera separates the low-noise high- speed detection and low-noise parallel amplification in the photo-detector array from the high- speed serialization and readout in the CCD/CMOS readout electronics, with high-gain low-noise parallel amplification as the noise isolation buffer between the two processes. All is made possible by the recent boom in nanotechnology - the core amplifier utilizes 60 nano-meters of amplification layer and 30 nano-meters of surface oxide layer to achieve low-noise high- sensitivity detection and amplification. As a result, the proposed low-light-level camera is expected to enable infrared Raman spectrometers of higher sensitivity and faster response time, thus more efficiently analyze biological samples and more accurately help diagnose diseases. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The proposed low-light-level infrared camera is an enabling technology for infrared Raman spectroscopy at beyond 1000 nm, which is a potentially important clinical tool for real-time diagnosis of diseases and in situ evaluation of living tissues.