New QHY product: QHY600 Back-Illuminated, Full Frame, 16-bit, 60 Megapixel, Cooled CMOS Camera

With the advantage of low readout noise and high-speed readout, CMOS technology has revolutionized astronomical imaging. A monochrome, back-illuminated, high-sensitivity, astronomical imaging camera is the ideal choice for astro-imagers. However, for years we have only seen the 4/3-inch, front-illuminated, monochrome cameras (QHY163M) with QE of about 60%, and one-inch, back-illuminated, monochrome cameras (QHY183M) with higher QE. Although these sensors are quite good and very suitable for beginners, they are still smaller than the full frame (35mm format) sensors desired for more serious deep sky astrophotography. Also, both of these sensors have 12-bit A/D. To achieve 1e- of read noise you must increase the gain and lose some dynamic range in the process, or you use low gain and lose some precision in sampling and greyscale levels.

The new QHY600 is about to change all of this.

Ultra high resolution: 60 megapixels and full frame

The QHY600 uses the latest SONY back-illuminated sensor, the IMX455, a full frame (35mm format - 36mm x 24mm) sensor with 3.76um pixels and native 16-bit A/D. This sensor is available in both monochrome and color versions. The QHY600 ends the days of non-16bit CMOS cameras and it ends the days non-full frame (and larger) monochrome CMOS cameras.

Native 16-biT ADC with 65536 Levels

The QHY600 is cooled CMOS camera with native 16-bit A/D on-chip. The output is real 16-bits with 65536 levels. Compared to 12-bit and 14-bit A/D, a 16-bit A/D yields higher sample resolution and the system gain will be less than 1e-/ADU with no sample error noise and very low read noise.

Great Full Well: >51ke- at 3.76um >80ke under extend mode

One benefit of the back-illuminated CMOS structure is improved full well capacity. This is particularly helpful for sensors with small pixels. Even with unbinned, 3.76um pixels, the QHY600 has a full well capacity of more than 51ke-. When binned 2x2 to 7.5um the full well is 196ke- and when binned 3x3 to 11um the full well is 441ke-.

Breakthrough Low Read Noise: 1.0e to 3.7e

The QHY600 has only one electron of read noise at high gain and 4FPS high readout speed. One electron of read noise means the camera can achieve a SNR>3 at only 4 to 6 photons. This is perfect performance when conditions are photon limited, i.e., short exposures, narrow band imaging, etc., making this large area sensor ideal for sky surveys and time domain astronomy in astronomy imaging and for fluorescence imaging,DNA sequencer and microscope imaging for biology.

Back-Illuminated, Electronic Rolling Shutter, Low Dark Current

Equipped with Sony IMX 455, QHY600 is a back-illuminated Scientific CMOS Camera with extremely low dark current (0.003e/p/s@-20C) using SONY's Exmor BSI CMOS technology and electric shutter. In general, the fan-blade mechanical shutter will be broken if it is used 200,000 times or so, and in some specific cases it is easy to fail to switch on or off. The advantage of an electronic shutter over mechanical shutter is high reliability and stability when the observatory shoots a large number of pictures.

Best Match for RASA System

The round camera case design of QHY600 and the imager size is best match for RASA systems.

USB3.0 / 10 Gigabit Filber

Both QHY600 photographic version and professional version supports the USB3.0 ultra high speed port. The professional version also has two 10 Gigabit Filber port to support the fiber connection. Fiber connection will have very high stability and very long transfer distance (up to 300 meter)

Application

Astronomy Photographic,All sky meteor monitor, microscope imaging,fluorescence imaging,high throughout DNA sequencer,aerial photogrammetry.

Two versions: Scientific and Professional version

The QHY600 camera will be available in two versions: a scientific, or Professional version (QHY600U3G20) and a Photograph version (QHY600U3). The differences between these two versions include:
1. The Professional version has a high-speed fiber interface and USB3.0 interface. The Photographic version has only a USB3.0 interface.
2. The Professional version may have more on-camera DDR3 memory than photograph version.
3. The professional version has rich, external, expandable I/O signals as well as a rich resource that allow the user to customize the FPGA inside the camera.
4. The Professional version is more expensive than Photographic version.
5. The Professional version has a longer body to accommodate the length of the optical fiber interface.

Comparing the IMX455 and KAI11002 35mm Format Monochrome Sensors
Recently, Sony released several new CMOS sensors, including the 60 Megapixel, full frame, IMX455. QHYCCD uses this sensor in its new QHY600 cameras. The question then is how does this sensor compare with the ubiquitous KAI11002? We know that the KAI-11000/11002 is an interline CCD sensor and the IMX455 is a CMOS sensor. But what are the advantages of the new IMX455 compared to the KAI11002?

Specifications