A low noise, wide dynamic range TOF laser radar receiver based on pulse shaping techniques

Abstract A time of flight (TOF) laser radar receiver based on unipolar-to-bipolar pulse shaping at its input is presented. The pulse shaping and the non-linear feedback of the transimpedance preamplifier give low timing error and jitter over a wide input pulse amplitude range. This receiver is realized in a 0.35μm CMOS technology and intended to be used in laser ranging with laser pulses of width ~1ns. Post-layout simulations show a dynamic range of more than 1:200000, a trans-impedance gain of 117dbΩ, a bandwidth of 260MHz and an input-referred equivalent current noise of 70nA. These results are achieved while keeping the walk error less than ±55ps (9mm) without any need for complicated calibration methods