Area detectors capable of recording X-ray diffraction patterns at high count-rates

The Princeton SIT X-ray detector is an electro-optical system designed for recording X-ray diffraction patterns from biological structures. The detector, based on a silicon intensified-target vidicon (SIT), can measure X-ray intensities over an 80 mm diameter area without the count-rate limit characteristic of a photon counting system. Over a wide range of intensities, the accuracy of measurement approaches the quantum limit. Several versions of the device have been constructed, tested and applied to important biophysical problems. The SIT detector has proved particularly useful for the study of dynamic systems with the aid of the intense synchrotron radiation X-ray beams available at EMBL/DESY and SSRL/SLAC. The detectors used in such experiments at future synchrotron radiation sources are likely to be similar to the SIT detector, but based instead on a newer electro-optical device, the solid state imager (e.g. CCD). (orig.)