Design and fabrication of the AODS: All-in-One Digitizer System-on-chip

Nalu Scientific will develop the “AODS”, a fast measurement tool to readout high speed signals generated by particles in particle and high energy physics experiments. Detection of individual charged particles and photons and estimation of their properties is the basis for a wide range of scientific and commercial applications from high-energy, nuclear and astrophysics to medical imaging and diagnosis and LIDAR. We are targeting the data acquisition market for medium to large scientific experiments in the energy or intensity frontiers. These complex experiments require hundreds to thousands of recording channels capable of fast data acquisition and signal processing. The AODS allows for timing resolutions on the order of 100s of picoseconds, which will translate to highly accurate estimates of charged particles and their tracks. Low cost, low power designs are especially attractive for experiments with thousands of recording channels. We propose to design and make commercially available the “AODS”: a low-cost, low-power and high-density waveform sampling chip capable of analog signal conditioning, fast waveform sampling, and integrated readout with high dynamic range mode. The AODS device will also have calibration and monitoring circuitry in addition to a deep sampling buffer making it suitable for large Particle Physics and High Energy Physics experiments with potentially long trigger delays. We designed a full AODS chip satisfying the specifications, thus demonstrating the feasibility of the project. The chip will be available for testing at the beginning of phase II. We will test performance and advance the design for robustness. We will also fabricate several revisions of the prototype and incrementally add features until desired chip is created. This device can be used by scientists in high energy and nuclear physics experiments for fast analog data acquisition. It also has applications in high-end general purpose instrumentations, medical/PET imaging, automotive and remote sensing (self-driving vehicles) with LIDAR. We anticipate the ability to sell the device as an OEM manufacturer, provide associated design services or license it to a larger device manufacturer due to the low cost and low power nature of the design which will give us a competitive edge.