Development of three-dimensional position-sensitive room temperature semiconductor gamma-ray spectrometers

Semiconductor detectors can provide better spectroscopic performance than scintillation or gas-filled detectors because of the small ionization energy required to generate each electron-hole pair. Indeed, cryogenically cooled high-purity germanium detectors have played the dominant role whenever the best gamma-ray spectroscopy is required. A decades-long search for other semiconductor detectors that could provide higher stopping power and could operate at room temperature has been ongoing. Wide-band-gap semiconductors, such as CdTe, CdZnTe, and HgI2, have captured the most attention. However, the use of these semiconductors in detectors has been hindered primarily by problems of charge trapping and material nonuniformity. Introduced in 1994, single-polarity charge sensing on semiconductor detectors has shown great promise in avoiding the hole-trapping problem, and the newly demonstrated three-dimensional position-sensing technique can significantly mitigate the degradation of energy resolution due to the nonuniformity of detector material. In addition, three-dimensional position sensitivity will provide unique imaging capabilities of these gamma-ray spectrometers. These devices are of interest for nuclear nonproliferation, medical imaging, gamma-ray astronomy, and high-energy physics applications. This paper reports the latest results using second-generation three-dimensional position-sensitive semiconductor spectrometers. The improvements over the first generation devices include: (1) Larger volume; (2) Improved anode design; (3) More reliable connections; (4) Enhanced electronic capability; and (5) Measurement of electron drift times. The new detectors and readout electronics (from IDE AS) are being assembled and tested