Development and Commercialization of an Integrating, Gain-Autoranging Hybrid Pixel X-ray Detector

In recent years, powerful X-ray light source facilities such as synchrotrons and free electron lasers have been developed for studying the structure of matter down to the atomic scale, and to create “molecular movies” of chemical reaction on time scales of picoseconds down to femtoseconds. Many fields of science and applied science are informed by these techniques and their results power the world economy. To push the knowledge frontier of these sciences, X-ray sources are being continually upgraded for properties like higher intensity and better focus. As a consequence, they come up against the limits of existing X-ray detectors to record intense X-ray pulses, and therefore they require new, advanced detectors with which to record their X-ray patterns. This grant will use newly-developed high end detector sensing electronics, and with them design and create a new high-resolution pixelated detector for taking high speed pictures of X-ray patterns. The new detector has the capability to integrate signals from X-ray patterns, and record them at orders of magnitude higher rate than is possible with existing commercial detector products used at these facilities. This detector is also a perfect companion for free electron laser sources, which have few suitable options for measuring the near-instantaneous X-ray diffraction and scattering patterns. The Phase II project builds on the success of the previous Phase I project, the fruits of which were: the development of new detector sensing electronics, the manufacture of a working small test detector, a test of operating at low temperature which showed how to remove the image noise, development of readout and image display software, and a design strategy for the Phase II project of scaling up the detector to the necessary size for world class research experiments. The excellent data quality produced by this new detector will inform many branches of science utilizing the diffraction, scattering, and microscopy techniques at these X-ray facilities. Researchers will be able to develop useful new technologies, such as improve aerospace materials with stress and strain measurements, design faster and lower power computer chips, or even determine the structure and kinetics of biomolecules, leading to advances in medicine and pharmaceuticals.