Hamamatsu Photonics have expanded and improved on their range of semi-conductor detectors, featuring photon counting capability, with the introduction of its new S12572 series of multi-pixel photon counter devices (MPPC). This new series of general purpose MPPC offers considerably reduced afterpulsing compared to the previous generation of MPPC detectors from the company.
This series are 3 by 3mm devices supplied in compact surface mount plastic packages, or through-hole ceramic packages. Various pixel configurations are available, with pitches of 25um, 50um and 100um and pixel numbers of 14,400, 3,600 and 900 respectively. Each pixel contains a quenching resistor so that simultaneous photon events can be counted separately and with a high degree of accuracy. The devices feature typical high gain values of 5.15E5 to 2.8E6, comparable to that achievable from a conventional photomultiplier tube.
Some other key areas of improvement include: greatly reduced dark count, reduced afterpulsing, increased photon detection efficiency, improvements in timing resolution and linearity as well as reduced crosstalk. The result of these and other improvements means that the range now has a much improved signal-to-noise ratio, wider operating voltage range, improved time resolution and a wider dynamic range.
These improvements make the series ideal for a variety of applications, including positron emission tomography, high-energy physics, DNA sequencing, fluorescence measurement, nuclear medicine, point of care systems, drug discovery, medical diagnostic equipment and environmental analysis.
Hamamatsu Photonics
