ATA-5000 Series Optical Preamplifier
Small signal amplification, Ultra low noise, High gain
Weak optical signals — from photodiodes, low-light detectors, and similar sensitive optical sensing applications — carry very little energy to begin with, and amplifying them for downstream measurement risks adding more noise than the original signal actually contains if the preamplifier itself isn't built for this specific job. Aigtek's ATA-5000 Series is purpose-built as an optical preamplifier, prioritising small-signal amplification with ultra-low noise and high gain over the broader, higher-power role a general amplifier serves elsewhere in the range.
The series offers 46dB or 60dB of voltage gain with bandwidth options from 1kHz~5MHz up to 1kHz~100MHz, 50Ω SMA input and output, and input equivalent noise voltage as low as 0.5nV/√Hz typical (ATA-5210 and ATA-5310). The ATA-5120 is the low-frequency exception: DC~1kHz bandwidth, 10kΩ input impedance and up to 10Vp-p output into a high-impedance load.
Aigtek lists infrared sensor detection, weak magnetic field sensor detection and optical detection with phototransistors as target applications: any setup where the signal of interest starts out too weak to measure directly and needs low-noise amplification before it can be usefully processed or analysed.
