Performance of 5-μm PIN diamond diodes as thermal neutron detectors

Contributors:   Jason Holmes, Jesse Brown, Franz A. Koeck, Holly Johnson, Manpuneet K. Benipal, Praneeth Kandlakunta, Anna Zaniewski, Ricardo Alarcon, Raymond Cao, Stephen M. Goodnick, and Robert J. Nemanich

ABSTRACT

Diamond PIN diodes with an approximately 5-m thick i-layer and coated with a thin boron nitride (BN) layer have been tested with a thermal neutron beam. For a flux of 4.4 106 n/s/cm2, count rates were on the order of 30–100 counts per second depending on the thickness of the BN neutron converter layer. Pulse height spectra showed features associated with and 7Li fission products consistent with the thickness of the BN layer. An irradiation test with a 1 MeV neutron equivalent fluence of 10 n/cm2 showed no significant alteration in the count rate of the tested detector.

Publisher: Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment,   Volume: 961,   163601 ||  Published: 2020-05 ||   PDF (1.09 MB) ||   Read More...