Patent ID: 7692707

Claim:
A solid-state image pickup apparatus for picking up images, comprising a solid-state image sensor, a charge multiplying device and an image signal temperature variation suppressing device, wherein said solid-state image sensor includes a plurality of photoelectric conversion devices arranged in a two-dimensional array on a plane of projection of an object image, a charge transfer device for transferring signal charges detected through photoelectric conversion by the respective photoelectric conversion devices, a charge-to-voltage conversion device for converting the signal charges transferred from the charge transfer device into voltage signals for output as image signals, and a temperature detecting device for detecting a sensor temperature of the solid-state image sensor, wherein said charge multiplying device multiplies the signal charges based on an impact ionization phenomenon caused by the signal charges passing through high electric field regions, said charge multiplying device being disposed upstream of said charge-to-voltage conversion device, and said imaging signal temperature variation suppressing device controls a driver voltage of the charge multiplying device in response to variations in the sensor temperature of the solid-state image sensor detected by said temperature detecting device, to suppress variations in charge multiplication gain of the charge multiplying device due to the variations in the sensor temperature of the solid-state image sensor, or electrically adjusts conversion gain of the charge-to-voltage conversion device in response to variations in the sensor temperature of the solid-state image sensor detected by said temperature detecting device, to suppress the variations in the charge multiplication gain of the charge multiplying device due to the variations in the sensor temperature of the solid-state image sensor, and wherein said image signal temperature variation suppressing device has a resistance control type resistance element as a feedback resister with a variable resistance, the resistance of the resistance control type resistance element being varied based on a result of the sensor temperature of the solid-state image sensor, to adjust an amplification factor of an amplifying function of the image signal temperature variation suppressing device to adjust electrically the conversion gain of the charge-to-voltage conversion device, thereby to suppress variations in the charge multiplication gain of the charge multiplication device due to the variations in the sensor temperature of the solid-state image sensor.