CVD diamond detectors

Diamond has many attractive properties which make it an ideal material both for particle detection in high-energy physics experiments and for dosimetry in medical fields. Up to early 1990, diamond has not found widespread applications in these fields because of the high cost and of the difficulties in selecting natural gems of suitable quality, with low levels of impurity content and crystal defects, which limit the carrier lifetime. The recently developed diamond manufacturing technology by chemical vapour deposition (CVD) has the potential of allowing low cost production of diamond in large sheets, with higher purity than natural diamond. In this paper we present a review of the most recent features and applications of CVD diamond as nuclear and X-ray/γ-ray detector.