First use of single-crystal diamonds as fission-fragment detector

Single-crystal chemical vapor-deposited diamond (sCVD) was investigated for its ability to act as fission-fragment detector. In particular we investigated timing and energy resolution for application in a simultaneous time-of-flight and energy measurement to determe the mass of the detected fission fragment. Previous tests have shown that poly-crystalline chemical vapor deposited (pCVD) diamonds provide sufficient timing resolution, but their poor energy resolution did not allow complete separation between very low-energy fission fragments, -particles and noise. Our present investigations proof artificial sCVD diamonds to show similar timing resolution as pCVD diamonds close to 100 ps. Improved pulse-height resolution allows the unequivocal separation of fission fragments, and the detection efficiency reaches 100%, but remains with about a few per cent behind requirements for fragment-mass identification. With high-speed digital electronics a timing resolution well below 100 ps is possible. However, the strongly varying quality of the presently available diamond material does not allow application on a sufficiently large scale within reasonable investments.

FREGEAU Marc Olivier;  OBERSTEDT Stephan;  BRYS Tomasz;  GAMBONI Thierry;  GEERTS Wouter;  HAMBSCH Franz-Josef;  OBERSTEDT A.;  VIDALI Marzio; 

2015-12-21

ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV

JRC94721

0168-9002,   

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168900215005185,    https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC94721,