In a CCD, this electron is stored within the walls of a photosite. When a photon of light strikes the surface of certain metal materials (like the silicon in a CCD chip) the energy imparted by the photon can release an electron from the metal.

It is this effect operating in a CCD chip which produces the electric charge stored in the photosites. In 1921, Albert Einstein received the Nobel Prize in physics, not for his famous theory of relativity, but rather for explaining the photoelectric effect. So, where does this charge collected during an exposure come from? The photoelectric effect.

Each photosite is surrounded by a non-conductive boundary which contains the charge that is collected during an exposure within the photosite.Ībove: A CCD chip consists of an array of photosites (squares) and a serial register for reading out the image data. For clarity in this discussion, 'photosites' will refer to the CCD chip and 'pixels' will refer to an image. Each photosite corresponds to an individual pixel in the final image and photosites are often referred to simply as pixels. The chip is divided into thousands or millions of tiny light sensitive squares (or sometimes rectangles) called photosites. We will see that this has certain implications for how the CCD operates.Ī CCD uses a thin silicon wafer chip. In the case of an astronomical CCD camera, this light is very dim. A CCD (charge-coupled device) is an electronic instrument for detecting light.

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