Hand-Held Gamma-Ray Spectrometer Based on High-Efficiency Frisch-Ring CdZnTe Detectors

Author

Cui, Yonggang ; Bolotnikov, Aleksey ; Camarda, Giuseppe ; Hossain, Anwar ; James, Ralph B. ; Geronimo, Gianluigi De ; Fried, Jack ; Connor, Paul O. ; Kargar, Alireza ; Harrison, Mark J. ; McGregor, Douglas S.

Author_Institution

Brookhaven Nat. Lab., Upton, NY

Volume

55

Issue

5

fYear

2008

Firstpage

2765

Lastpage

2769

Abstract

Frisch-ring CdZnTe detectors have demonstrated both good energy resolution, <1% FWHM at 662 keV, and good efficiency in detecting gamma rays, highlighting the strong potential of CdZnTe materials for such applications. We are designing a hand-held gamma-ray spectrometer based on Frisch-ring detectors at Brookhaven National Laboratory. It employs an 8 times 8 CdZnTe detector array to achieve a high volume of 19.2 cm³, so greatly improving detection efficiency. By using the front-end application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) developed at BNL, this spectrometer has a small profile and high energy-resolution. It includes a signal processing circuit, digitization and storage circuits, a high-voltage module, and a universal serial bus (USB) interface. In this paper, we detail the system´s structure and report the results of our tests with it.

Keywords

gamma-ray detection; gamma-ray spectrometers; nuclear electronics; semiconductor counters; signal processing; ASIC; BNL; CdZnTe; CdZnTe materials; Frisch-ring semiconductor detectors; USB; digitization; electron volt energy 662 keV; gamma ray detection; hand-held gamma-ray spectrometer; high-voltage module; signal processing circuit; specific integrated circuits; storage circuits; universal serial bus interface; CZT detector array; CdZnTe; Frisch-ring detector; gamma-ray spectrometer;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Nuclear Science, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9499

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TNS.2008.2004803

Filename

4689337