The effect of temperature on the behavior of semiconductor silicon surface barrier detectors

The operating behavior of a silicon surface barrier semiconductor detector of 5 mm thick depletion depth has been studied over the temperature range from 270 to 313 K by recording the spectrum of 24.8 MeV protons. The temperature of the detector was controlled and measured by a PC-based temperature controller. The analysis of the recorded spectra shows that the centroid of the proton energy peak remains constant up to certain optimum temperature and falls down rapidly to the lower channels beyond the optimum temperature. The % resolution of the detector was found to degrade from 0.5% to 4.9%. The observed degradation is found to be related to the increase in leakage current due to rise in the detector temperature