A large-format streak tube for compressed ultrafast photography

Streak cameras are powerful imaging instruments for studying ultrafast dynamics with the temporal resolution ranging from picosecond to attosecond. However, the confined detection area limits the information capacity of streak cameras, preventing them from fulfilling their potential in lidar, compressed ultrafast photography, etc. Here, we designed and manufactured a large-format streak tube with a large-size round-aperture gate, a spherical cathode, and a spherical screen, leading to an expanded detection area and a high spatial resolution. The simulation results show that the physical temporal resolution of the streak tube is better than 45 ps and the spatial resolutions are higher than 14 lp/mm in the whole area of 24 × 28 mm² on the cathode. The experiments demonstrate the streak tube's application potential in weak light imaging benefiting from the imaging magnification of 0.79, a photocathode radiance sensitivity of 37 mA/W, a radiant emitting gain of 11.6 at the wavelength of 500 nm, and a dynamic range higher than 512:1. Most importantly, in the photocathode area of Φ35 mm, the static spatial resolutions at the center and the edge along the slit (R = 16 mm) reach 32 and 28 lp/mm, respectively, and are higher than 10 lp/mm in the whole area of 24 × 28 mm² on the cathode, allowing for a considerable capacity for spatial information.