Semiconductor micropattern pixel detectors: a review of the beginnings

The innovation in monolithic and hybrid semiconductor 'micropattern' or 'reactive' pixel detectors for tracking in particle physics was actually to fit logic and pulse processing electronics with µW power on a pixel area of less than 0.04 mm2, retaining the characteristics of a traditional nuclear amplifier chain. The ns timing precision in conjunction with local memory and logic operations allowed event selection at > 10 MHz rates with unambiguous track reconstruction even at particle multiplicities > 10 cm-2. The noise in a channel was ~100 e- r.m.s. and enabled binary operation with random noise 'hits' at a level 30 Mrad, respectively