High dynamic range

A counter depth of 20 bits (~1 million counts) combined with the absence of detector noise ensures unprecedented contrast and dynamic range, another hallmark of all PILATUS3 detectors leading to excellent image and data quality (Fig. 2). Extremely strong and weak signals can be accurately detected on a single image.

Fig. 2: Superior dynamic range and point-spread function of PILATUS Hybrid Photon Counting detectors.
Details of diffraction images showing the same reflection of an insulin crystal. The images were acquired at a synchrotron beamline with identical parameters except for the detector distance which was adjusted to achieve the same resolution at the detector edge, depending on the detector size.
PILATUS: The 20-bit counter depth of the PILATUS Hybrid Photon Counting detector provides sufficient dynamic range to record 727,716 counts in the highest intensity pixel. Thanks to the excellent point-spread function, the spot is well confined to a small area. Furthermore, the sharp reflection profile of the low mosaicity crystal is accurately represented with a more than one-thousand-fold difference in intensity between neighboring pixels.
CCD: The same reflection recorded with a CCD contains many overloaded pixels. The reflection intensity is smeared out over a large area.