Evolution of charge emission for amorphous silicon FETs exposed to radiation

Large area flat panel radiation imagers are currently based on hydrogenated amorphous silicon (α-Si:H) devices. For extended use in medical applications and most industrial applications the properties of the panels can be altered by the high dose the panels experience. One characteristic of these panels is a dark offset due to emission of charge from deep trap states (detrapping currents) of the α-Si:H FETs. We report on a method of isolating the contribution of channel and contact (source/drain) silicon in a standard inverted gate FET to the total charge emission current and directly measure the time evolution of both. Additionally, we investigate changes in the charge emission coming from FETs on the imager panel as a function of radiation dose up to 15 Mrad (150 kGy) absorbed in the α-Si:H of the FETs.