학술논문

Automotive Three-Dimensional Vision Through a Single-Photon Counting SPAD Camera
Document Type
Periodical
Source
IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems IEEE Trans. Intell. Transport. Syst. Intelligent Transportation Systems, IEEE Transactions on. 17(3):782-795 Mar, 2016
Subject
Transportation
Aerospace
Communication, Networking and Broadcast Technologies
Computing and Processing
Robotics and Control Systems
Signal Processing and Analysis
Cameras
Photonics
Radiation detectors
Arrays
Automotive engineering
Distance measurement
Demodulation
3-D ranging
2-D imaging
single-photon avalanche diodes (SPADs)
time-of-flight (ToF)
range-finding
Language
ISSN
1524-9050
1558-0016
Abstract
We present an optical 3-D ranging camera for automotive applications that is able to provide a centimeter depth resolution over a $\mbox{40}^{\circ} \times \mbox{20}^{\circ}$ field of view up to 45 m with just 1.5 W of active illumination at 808 nm. The enabling technology we developed is based on a CMOS imager chip of 64 $\times$ 32 pixels, each with a single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) and three 9-bit digital counters, able to perform lock-in time-of-flight calculation of individual photons emitted by a laser illuminator, reflected by the objects in the scene, and eventually detected by the camera. Due to the SPAD single-photon sensitivity and the smart in-pixel processing, the camera provides state-of-the-art performance at both high frame rates and very low light levels without the need for scanning and with global shutter benefits. Furthermore, the CMOS process is automotive certified.