The Capacitive Division Image Readout: A Novel Imaging Device for Microchannel Plate Detectors

The Capacitive Division Image Readout (C-DIR) is a simple and novel image readout for photon counting detectors offering major performance advantages. C-DIR is a charge centroiding device comprising three elements; (i) a resistive anode providing event charge localization, event current return path and electrical isolation from detector high voltage, (ii) a dielectric substrate which capacitively couples the event transient signal to the third element, (iii) the readout device; an array of capacitively coupled electrodes which divides the signal among the readout charge measurement nodes. The resistive anode and dielectric substrate constitute the rear interface of the detector and capacitively couple the signal to the external C-DIR readout device. The C-DIR device is a passive, multilayer printed circuit board type device comprising a matrix of isolated electrodes whose geometries define the capacitive network. C-DIR is manufactured using conventional PCB geometries and is straightforward and economical to construct. C-DIR's robustness and simplicity belie its performance advantages. Its capacitive nature avoids partition noise, the Poisson noise associated with collection of discrete charges. The dominant noise limiting position resolution is electronic noise. However C-DIR also presents a low input capacitance to the readout electronics, minimising this noise component thus maximising spatial resolution. Optimisation of the C-DIR pattern-edge geometry can provide similar to 90% linear dynamic range. We present data showing image resolution and linearity of the C-DIR device in a microchannel plate detector and describe various electronic charge measurement scheme designed to exploit the full performance potential of the C-DIR device.