A novel approach for pulse width measurements with a high precision (8 ps RMS) TDC in an FPGA

Abstract

High precision time measurements are a crucial element in particle identification experiments, which likewise require pulse width information for Time-over-Threshold (ToT) measurements and charge measurements (correlated with pulse width). In almost all of the FPGA-based TDC applications, pulse width measurements are implemented using two of the TDC channels for leading and trailing edge time measurements individually. This method however, requires twice the number of resources. In this paper we present the latest precision improvements in the high precision TDC (8 ps RMS) developed before [1], as well as the novel way of measuring ToT using a single TDC channel, while still achieving high precision (as low as 11.7 ps RMS). The effect of voltage, generated by a DC-DC converter, over the precision is also discussed. Finally, the outcome of the temperature change over the pulse width measurement is shown and a correction method is suggested to limit the degradation.