Design and development of compact readout electronics with silicon photomultiplier array for a compact imaging detector

This work aims at developing compact readout electronics for a compact imaging detector module with silicon photomultiplier （SPM） array. The detector module consists of a LYSO crystal array coupling with a SensL’s 4×4 SPM array. A compact multiplexed readout based on a discretized positioning circuit （DPC） was developed to reduce the readout channels from 16 to 4 outputs. Different LYSO crystal arrays of 4×4, 8×8 and 12×12 with pixel sizes of 3.2, 1.6 and 1.0 mm respectively, have been tested with the compact readout board using a 137 Cs source. The initial results show that the compact imaging detector module with the compact multiplexed readout could clearly resolve 1 mm×1 mm×10 mm LYSO scintillation crystal array except those at the edges. The detector’s intrinsic spatial resolution up to 1 mm can be achieved with the 3 mm×3 mm size SPMArray4 through light sharing and compact multiplexed readout. Our results indicate that this detector module is feasible for the development of high-resolution compact PET.