Patent ID: 7259394

Claim:
A solid-state imaging device, comprising: photodiodes arranged two-dimensionally on a semiconductor substrate; a vertical transfer charge-coupled device for vertically transferring signal charges read out from the photodiodes; a horizontal transfer charge-coupled device for receiving and horizontally transferring signal charges transferred by the vertical transfer charge-coupled device; an unwanted electron eliminator for eliminating unwanted electrons; and a potential barrier between the horizontal transfer charge-coupled device and the unwanted electron eliminator, wherein the potential barrier includes: a first n-type diffusion layer that is selectively formed on the surface of the semiconductor substrate; a second n-type diffusion layer that is in contact with one end of the first n-type diffusion layer and has a higher impurity concentration than the first n-type diffusion layer; and a third n-type diffusion layer that is in contact with the other end of the first n-type diffusion layer and has a higher impurity concentration than the first n-type diffusion layer.