High Energy resolution alpha spectrometer using a cryogenic detector

Cryogenic particle detectors have recently been adopted in radiation detection and measurement because of their high energy resolution. Many of these detectors have demonstrated energy resolutions better than the theoretical limit of semiconductor detectors. We report the development of alpha spectrometer using a micro-fabricated magnetic calorimeter coupled to a large-area particle absorber. A piece of gold foil of was glued to the paramagnetic temperature sensor made of sputtered Au:Er film to serve as an absorber for incident alpha particles. We performed experiments with 241Am source at cryogen free adiabatic demagnetization refrigerator (CF-ADR). A high energy resolution of 6.8 keV in FWHM was obtained for 5.5 MeV alpha particles