Reviews Online

[As mentioned in some recent comments on this blog, the latest (vol. 69 no. 6, June 2022) issue of IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices has many interesting papers related to image sensors. I will post summaries here in the coming days.] In an invited paper in the June 2022 issue of IEEE TED, Jiaju Ma et al. write: The quanta image sensor (QIS) is a photon counting image sensor that has been implemented using different electron devices, including impact ionization gain devices, such as the single-photon avalanche detectors (SPADs), and low-capacitance, high conversion-gain devices, such as modified CMOS image sensors (CIS) with deep sub-electron read noise and/or low noise readout signal chains. This article primarily focuses on CIS QIS, but recent progress of both types is addressed. Signal processing progress, such as denoising, critical to improving apparent signal-to-noise ratio, is also reviewed as an enabling co-innovation. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=97...

My Friend Michael Guidash just informed me that the special issue for solid state image sensors on IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices in now available online. Here is a link to the table of content: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=9780655 The list of papers can be found here: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/mostRecentIssue.jsp?punumber=16 

From DigiTimes Asia news: https://www.digitimes.com/news/a20220527PD203/sensor-surveillance.html China security surveillance market boom buoys SmartSens The expanding security surveillance market in China continues to boost the shipments of CMOS image sensor (CIS) chips from Chinese CIS startup SmartSens Technology, which has entered the supply chains of China's first-tier security camera vendors including Hikvision Digital Technology, Uniview Technologies and Dahua Technology, according to industry sources. IDC statistics show China's security surveillance market scale reached US$16.2 billion in 2021 and is estimated to grow to US$20.1 billion in 2022, for a CAGR of 13.6% for the period. High-definition security camera lenses have become the tipping point of market growth, fast driving CIS sales in China, the sources said. Since launching its first CIS chip SC1035 in 2014, SmartSens has quickly built a strong presence in the security surveillance sector. Its CIS shipments topp...

From Semiconductor Digest news:  Global installed capacity for image sensors was one million 200mm-equivalent wafers per month at the end of 2021. According to the new Global Wafer Capacity 2022 report, image sensor capacity is forecast to increase 13% in 2022. By the end of 2026, installed capacity for image sensors is projected to be 1.8 million 200mm-equiv. wafers per month. That’s an average annual growth rate of 12.5% over the forecast period, making image sensor capacity among the fastest growing segments. While the Covid-19 pandemic negatively impacted the image sensor market in 2020, growth returned in 2021. Demand for digital imaging is increasing in virtually all areas, including cellphones, automotive, machine vision, security cameras, webcams, drones, and more. While Sony in Japan is the industry’s leading CMOS image sensor supplier, the combined CIS capacity of Samsung and SK Hynix made Korea the industry’s biggest source for production of image sensors at the end of 2...

A team from UCLA has published a review article titled "At the intersection of optics and deep learning: statistical inference, computing, and inverse design" in Optica Advances in Optics and Photonics: Deep learning has been revolutionizing information processing in many fields of science and engineering owing to the massively growing amounts of data and the advances in deep neural network architectures. As these neural networks are expanding their capabilities toward achieving state-of-the-art solutions for demanding statistical inference tasks in various applications, there appears to be a global need for low-power, scalable, and fast computing hardware beyond what existing electronic systems can offer. Optical computing might potentially address some of these needs with its inherent parallelism, power efficiency, and high speed. Recent advances in optical materials, fabrication, and optimization techniques have significantly enriched the design capabilities in optics and ...

From PRNewsWire: https://www.prnewswire.com/ news-releases/smartsens-goes- public-on-shanghai-stock- exchange-and-sees-shares- surge-on-the-first-trading- day-301552661.html SHANGHAI, May 23, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- On May 20, 2022, SmartSens was officially listed on the Science and Technology Innovation Board of the Shanghai Stock Exchange (Stock Code: 688213). On the first day of trading, SmartSens shares surged by 79.82%, with a total market value of 22.66 billion yuan. SmartSens Technology (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. (Stock Code: 688213) is a high-performance CMOS image sensor (CIS) chip design company. It is headquartered in Shanghai and has research centers in many cities around the world. SmartSens has been dedicated to pushing forward the frontier of imaging technology and growing in popularity among customers since it was established. SmartSens' CMOS image sensors provide advanced imaging solutions for a broad range of areas such as surveillance, machine vision, automotive and cellp...

From arXiv.org --- You Li et al. write: Autonomous vehicles rely on perception systems to understand their surroundings for further navigation missions. Cameras are essential for perception systems due to the advantages of object detection and recognition provided by modern computer vision algorithms, comparing to other sensors, such as LiDARs and radars. However, limited by its inherent imaging principle, a standard RGB camera may perform poorly in a variety of adverse scenarios, including but not limited to: low illumination, high contrast, bad weather such as fog/rain/snow, etc. Meanwhile, estimating the 3D information from the 2D image detection is generally more difficult when compared to LiDARs or radars. Several new sensing technologies have emerged in recent years to address the limitations of conventional RGB cameras. In this paper, we review the principles of four novel image sensors: infrared cameras, range-gated cameras, polarization cameras, and event cameras . Their compa...