This report presents results from a series of experiments in which YAG samples (undoped, as well as doped with Nd and Cr3+) were exposed to ionizing radiation (gamma rays and UV). These experiments were performed for the purpose of investigating the various phtodarkening processes taking place in these materials in response to the ionizing radiation. The purpose of this investigation was to establish whether and how co-doping YAG with Cr3+ improves the material's resistance to photodarkening due to the ionizing radiation. The experiments tracked time-resolved transmittance of the samples at 1064 nm in immediate response a pulsed exposure to the ionizing radiation, as well as steady-state spectrally-resolved changed in the samples' optical absorption after the irradiation. The investigation revealed a number of photodarkening processes occurring in the samples in response to the ionizing radiation, both transient and permanent. It was further revealed that inclusion of Cr3+ ions in YAG significantly reduces these photodarkening processes, improving the material's radiation resistance. It was observed that materials containing at least 0.5 at% Cr3+ are essentially radiation-hardened, resisting both transient and steady-state changes in transmittance observed in the materials not containing Cr3+.

Pendent

Neste trabalho foram avaliadas as principais características dosimétricas de diodos crescidos pelos métodos de Fusão Zonal (FZ) e Czochralski magnético (MCz), resistentes a danos de radiação, quando aplicados em dosimetria de processos de irradiação industrial com elétrons (1,5 MeV) e raios gama (60Co). O sistema dosimétrico proposto baseia-se no registro de valores de correntes elétricas geradas nos diodos devido à passagem da radiação ionizante. A uniformidade de resposta de um lote de dispositivos foi analisada para os diodos FZ do tipo n irradiados com raios gama. Para uma dose de até 5 kGy obteve-se um coeficiente de variação de 1,25% dos valores de corrente elétrica registrados. A queda da sensibilidade dos diodos com o acúmulo de dose (Total Ionizing Dose TID) foi observada, de acordo com o esperado, para ambos os diodos FZ e MCz, sendo mais acentuada para dispositivos do tipo n ou com resistividade menor, quando irradiados com raios gama. Nos procedimentos de irradiação com elétrons foram utilizados dois protótipos de sonda dosimétrica, sendo que um deles foi projetado para evitar a deterioração dos contatos elétricos e da metalização dos diodos, fenômeno observado durante o desenvolvimento do projeto. A queda da sensibilidade dos diodos FZ e MCz pré-irradiados foi de aproximadamente 10% e 40%, respectivamente, durante os procedimentos de irradiação com elétrons para uma dose acumulada total de 1,25 MGy. A influência dos danos causados por esse tipo de radiação nas propriedades elétricas dos diodos FZ e MCz foi avaliada por meio das medições de corrente de fuga e da capacitância em função da tensão de polarização. A corrente de fuga, que aumenta com a dose de radiação acumulada, não contribui significativamente para a formação do sinal de corrente durante a irradiação, uma vez que os diodos são operados no modo fotovoltaico, ou seja, sem tensão de polarização. Para o diodo MCz não foram observadas alterações significativas dos valores de tensão de depleção total, evidenciando sua maior tolerância aos danos induzidos pela radiação, como esperado. Como durante os procedimentos de irradiação com elétrons há uma variação acentuada dos valores de temperatura, a influência deste parâmetro para as medições de corrente elétrica foi avaliada por meio da extrapolação dos valores de corrente de fuga até 35°C. A contribuição da corrente de fuga para a corrente induzida pela radiação, devido ao aumento da temperatura, não ultrapassa 0,1% para os diodos FZ e MCz. A influência do tipo de radiação, elétrons ou raios gama, na pré-dose dos diodos foi avaliada para o dispositivo FZ do tipo n e observou-se que a pré-irradiação com elétrons é mais eficiente no tocante à queda da sensibilidade dos dispositivos. Os resultados apresentados neste trabalho indicam a potencialidade da aplicação dos diodos FZ e MCz como dosímetros em processos de irradiação de rotina com raios gama e elétrons. Vale ressaltar que a vantagem do sistema proposto reside na possibilidade de acompanhamento em tempo real dos processos envolvidos, sobretudo para elétrons, permitindo a monitoração dos parâmetros dos aceleradores, tais como velocidade de esteira e corrente elétrica de feixe. / In this work the main dosimetric characteristics of rad-hard Float Zone (FZ) and magnetic Czochralski (MCz) diodes to electrons (1.5 MeV) and gamma (60Co) radiation are evaluated. The dosimetric system proposed is based on electrical current measurements due to radiation interactions on the devices. The batch response uniformity was studied for the n-type FZ diodes irradiated with gamma rays. The coefficient of variation of the current measurement was about 1.25% at 5 kGy of accumulated dose. A sensitivity decrease with the increase of the accumulated dose (Total Ionizing Dose TID) was observed for both FZ and MCz diodes. For gamma irradiation, these effect is more pronounced for n-type or smaller resistivity diodes. Two types of dosimetric probe were used on the electron irradiation procedures, one of them specially designed to avoid the deterioration of the electrical contacts and the diodes metallization. The sensitivity of the preirradiated FZ and MCz diodes fell about 10% and 40%, respectively, during electron irradiation at 1.25 MGy of accumulated dose. The effect of electron radiation damage on the electrical properties of the diodes was studied by the means of leakage current and capacitance measurements as a function of bias voltage. The leakage current increases with the accumulated dose but does not contributes significantly to the current signal, since the diodes are operated in photovoltaic mode, without bias voltage. For the MCz diode no change in the full depletion voltage was observed, which indicates its higher tolerance to radiation-induced damage, as expected. During electron irradiation the temperature increases and in order to determine its influence for the current signals, the leakage current values were extrapolated up to 35 °C. The contribution does not exceed 0.1% for FZ and MCz diodes. The effect of the radiation type, electrons or gamma rays, on the predose procedures was analyzed for the FZ n-type device and was observed that the electron pre-irradiation is more efficient regarding the sensitivity decrease. The present work indicates the potential application of FZ and MCz diodes as dosimeters in gamma rays and in electron routine irradiation processes. It is worth noting that the proposed system advantage relies on the possibility of real-time monitoring of electron accelerator parameters.

Neste trabalho foram avaliadas as principais características dosimétricas de diodos crescidos pelos métodos de Fusão Zonal (FZ) e Czochralski magnético (MCz), resistentes a danos de radiação, quando aplicados em dosimetria de processos de irradiação industrial com elétrons (1,5 MeV) e raios gama (60Co). O sistema dosimétrico proposto baseia-se no registro de valores de correntes elétricas geradas nos diodos devido à passagem da radiação ionizante. A uniformidade de resposta de um lote de dispositivos foi analisada para os diodos FZ do tipo n irradiados com raios gama. Para uma dose de até 5 kGy obteve-se um coeficiente de variação de 1,25% dos valores de corrente elétrica registrados. A queda da sensibilidade dos diodos com o acúmulo de dose (Total Ionizing Dose TID) foi observada, de acordo com o esperado, para ambos os diodos FZ e MCz, sendo mais acentuada para dispositivos do tipo n ou com resistividade menor, quando irradiados com raios gama. Nos procedimentos de irradiação com elétrons foram utilizados dois protótipos de sonda dosimétrica, sendo que um deles foi projetado para evitar a deterioração dos contatos elétricos e da metalização dos diodos, fenômeno observado durante o desenvolvimento do projeto. A queda da sensibilidade dos diodos FZ e MCz pré-irradiados foi de aproximadamente 10% e 40%, respectivamente, durante os procedimentos de irradiação com elétrons para uma dose acumulada total de 1,25 MGy. A influência dos danos causados por esse tipo de radiação nas propriedades elétricas dos diodos FZ e MCz foi avaliada por meio das medições de corrente de fuga e da capacitância em função da tensão de polarização. A corrente de fuga, que aumenta com a dose de radiação acumulada, não contribui significativamente para a formação do sinal de corrente durante a irradiação, uma vez que os diodos são operados no modo fotovoltaico, ou seja, sem tensão de polarização. Para o diodo MCz não foram observadas alterações significativas dos valores de tensão de depleção total, evidenciando sua maior tolerância aos danos induzidos pela radiação, como esperado. Como durante os procedimentos de irradiação com elétrons há uma variação acentuada dos valores de temperatura, a influência deste parâmetro para as medições de corrente elétrica foi avaliada por meio da extrapolação dos valores de corrente de fuga até 35°C. A contribuição da corrente de fuga para a corrente induzida pela radiação, devido ao aumento da temperatura, não ultrapassa 0,1% para os diodos FZ e MCz. A influência do tipo de radiação, elétrons ou raios gama, na pré-dose dos diodos foi avaliada para o dispositivo FZ do tipo n e observou-se que a pré-irradiação com elétrons é mais eficiente no tocante à queda da sensibilidade dos dispositivos. Os resultados apresentados neste trabalho indicam a potencialidade da aplicação dos diodos FZ e MCz como dosímetros em processos de irradiação de rotina com raios gama e elétrons. Vale ressaltar que a vantagem do sistema proposto reside na possibilidade de acompanhamento em tempo real dos processos envolvidos, sobretudo para elétrons, permitindo a monitoração dos parâmetros dos aceleradores, tais como velocidade de esteira e corrente elétrica de feixe. / In this work the main dosimetric characteristics of rad-hard Float Zone (FZ) and magnetic Czochralski (MCz) diodes to electrons (1.5 MeV) and gamma (60Co) radiation are evaluated. The dosimetric system proposed is based on electrical current measurements due to radiation interactions on the devices. The batch response uniformity was studied for the n-type FZ diodes irradiated with gamma rays. The coefficient of variation of the current measurement was about 1.25% at 5 kGy of accumulated dose. A sensitivity decrease with the increase of the accumulated dose (Total Ionizing Dose TID) was observed for both FZ and MCz diodes. For gamma irradiation, these effect is more pronounced for n-type or smaller resistivity diodes. Two types of dosimetric probe were used on the electron irradiation procedures, one of them specially designed to avoid the deterioration of the electrical contacts and the diodes metallization. The sensitivity of the preirradiated FZ and MCz diodes fell about 10% and 40%, respectively, during electron irradiation at 1.25 MGy of accumulated dose. The effect of electron radiation damage on the electrical properties of the diodes was studied by the means of leakage current and capacitance measurements as a function of bias voltage. The leakage current increases with the accumulated dose but does not contributes significantly to the current signal, since the diodes are operated in photovoltaic mode, without bias voltage. For the MCz diode no change in the full depletion voltage was observed, which indicates its higher tolerance to radiation-induced damage, as expected. During electron irradiation the temperature increases and in order to determine its influence for the current signals, the leakage current values were extrapolated up to 35 °C. The contribution does not exceed 0.1% for FZ and MCz diodes. The effect of the radiation type, electrons or gamma rays, on the predose procedures was analyzed for the FZ n-type device and was observed that the electron pre-irradiation is more efficient regarding the sensitivity decrease. The present work indicates the potential application of FZ and MCz diodes as dosimeters in gamma rays and in electron routine irradiation processes. It is worth noting that the proposed system advantage relies on the possibility of real-time monitoring of electron accelerator parameters.

<p>The ATLAS experiment is a general purpose experiment being constructed at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, Geneva. ATLAS is designed to exploit the full physics potential of LHC, in particular to study topics con- cerning the Higgs mechanism, Super-symmetry and CP violation. The cross sections for the processes under study are extremely small, requiring very high luminosity colliding beams. The SemiConductor Tracker (SCT) is an essential part of the Inner Detector tracking system of ATLAS. The active elements of the SCT is 4088 detector modules, tiled on four barrel cylinders and eighteen endcap disks. As a consequence of the high luminosity, the detector modules will operate in a harsh radiation environment. This the- sis describes work concerning radiation hardness, beam test performance and methods for production testing of detector modules. The radiation hardness studies have been focused on the electrical performance of the front-end ASIC and the detector module. The results have identifed features of the ASIC failing after irradiation and conrmed the good performance of the re-designed ASIC. The beam tests have been performed in the late prototyping and the pre-production phase, verifying the specied performance of the detector modules. Special effort have been made to evaluate the performance of irradiated detector modules. The assembly, quality assurance and characterisation of the detector modules will be done in the collaborating institutes. The thesis reports on methods developed for use during the production, to assess the electrical performance.</p>

Electronic components, based on current semiconductor technologies and operating in radiation rich environments, suffer degradation of their performance as a result of radiation exposure. Silicon carbide (SiC) provides an alternate solution as a radiation hard material, because of its wide bandgap and higher atomic displacement energies, for devices intended for radiation environment applications. However, the radiation tolerance and reliability of SiC-based devices needs to be understood by testing devices  under controlled radiation environments. These kinds of studies have been previously performed on diodes and MESFETs, but multilayer devices such as bipolar junction transistors (BJT) have not yet been studied. In this thesis, SiC material, BJTs fabricated from SiC, and various dielectrics for SiC passivation are studied by exposure to high energy ion beams with selected energies and fluences. The studies reveal that the implantation induced crystal damage in SiC material can be partly recovered at relatively low temperatures, for damag elevels much lower than needed for amorphization. The implantation experiments performed on BJTs in the bulk of devices show that the degradation in deviceperformance produced by low dose ion implantations can be recovered at 420 oC, however, higher doses produce more resistant damage. Ion induced damage at the interface of passivation layer and SiC in BJT has also been examined in this thesis. It is found that damaging of the interface by ionizing radiation reduces the current gain as well. However, for this type of damage, annealing at low temperatures further reduces the gain. Silicon dioxide (SiO2) is today the dielectric material most often used for gate dielectric or passivation layers, also for SiC. However, in this thesis several alternate passivation materials are investigated, such as, AlN, Al2O3 and Ta2O5. These materials are deposited by atomic layer deposition (ALD) both as single layers and in stacks, combining several different layers. Al2O3 is further investigated with respect to thermalstability and radiation hardness. It is observed that high temperature treatment of Al2O3 can substantially improve the performance of the dielectric film. A radiation hardness study furthermore reveals that Al2O3 is more resistant to ionizing radiation than currently used SiO2 and it is a suitable candidate for devices in radiation rich applications. / QC 20120117

The ATLAS experiment is a general purpose experiment being constructed at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, Geneva. ATLAS is designed to exploit the full physics potential of LHC, in particular to study topics con- cerning the Higgs mechanism, Super-symmetry and CP violation. The cross sections for the processes under study are extremely small, requiring very high luminosity colliding beams. The SemiConductor Tracker (SCT) is an essential part of the Inner Detector tracking system of ATLAS. The active elements of the SCT is 4088 detector modules, tiled on four barrel cylinders and eighteen endcap disks. As a consequence of the high luminosity, the detector modules will operate in a harsh radiation environment. This the- sis describes work concerning radiation hardness, beam test performance and methods for production testing of detector modules. The radiation hardness studies have been focused on the electrical performance of the front-end ASIC and the detector module. The results have identifed features of the ASIC failing after irradiation and conrmed the good performance of the re-designed ASIC. The beam tests have been performed in the late prototyping and the pre-production phase, verifying the specied performance of the detector modules. Special effort have been made to evaluate the performance of irradiated detector modules. The assembly, quality assurance and characterisation of the detector modules will be done in the collaborating institutes. The thesis reports on methods developed for use during the production, to assess the electrical performance.

Advances in space and nuclear technologies are limited by the capabilities of the conventional silicon (Si) electronics. Hence, there is a need to explore materials beyond Si with enhanced properties to operate in extreme environments. In this regards, silicon carbide (4H-SiC), a wide bandgap semiconductor, provides suitable solutions. In this thesis, radiation effects of 4H-SiC bipolar devices, circuits and dielectrics for SiC are investigated under various radiation types. We have demonstrated for the first time the radiation hardness of 4H-SiC logic circuits exposed to extremely high doses (332 Mrad) of gamma radiation and protons. Comparisons with previously available literature show that our 4H-SiC bipolar junction transistor (BJT) is 2 orders of magnitude more tolerant under gamma radiation to existing Si-technology. 4H-SiC devices and circuits irradiated with 3 MeV protons show about one order of magnitude higher tolerance in comparison to Si. Numerical simulations of the device showed that the ionization is most influential in the degradation process by introducing interface states and oxide charges that lower the current gain. Due to the gain reduction of the BJT, the voltage reference of the logic circuit has been affected and this, in turn, degrades the voltage transfer characteristics of the OR-NOR gates. One of the key advantages of 4H-SiC over other wide bandgap materials is the possibility to thermally grow silicon oxide (SiO2) and process device in line with advanced silicon technology. However, there are still questions about the reliability of SiC/SiO2 interface under high power, high temperature and radiation rich environments. In this regard, aluminium oxide (Al2O3), a chemically and thermally stable dielectric, has been investigated. It has been shown that the surface cleaning treatment prior to deposition of a dielectric layer together with the post dielectric annealing has a crucial effect on interface and oxide quality. We have demonstrated a new method to evaluate the interface between dielectric/4H-SiC utilizing an optical free carrier absorption technique to quantitative measure the charge carrier trapping dynamics. The radiation hardness of Al2O3/4H-SiC is demonstrated and the data suggests that Al2O3 is better choice of dielectric for devices in radiation rich applications. / <p>QC 20170119</p>

In preparation for the large backgrounds expected to be present in the Belle II detector from the SuperKEKB e+e- collider, the radiation hardness of several large (5 x 5 x 30 cm3) thallium doped cesium iodide (CsI(Tl)) scintillation crystals are studied. The crystal samples studied consist of 2 spare crystals from the Belle experiment using PIN diode readout and 7 spare crystals from the BaBar experiment using photomultiplier tube readout. The radiation hardness of the scintillation properties of the CsI(Tl) crystals was studied at accumulated 1 MeV photon doses of 2, 10 and 35 Gy. At each dose, the longitudinal uniformity of the crystals light yield, scintillation decay times, time resolution and energy resolution was measured. As the Belle II collaboration is considering an upgrade to pure CsI crystals if CsI(Tl) does not satisfy radiation hardness requirements, the scintillation properties of a pure CsI scintillation crystal were also measured and compared to the CsI(Tl) crystal measurements. In addition to experimental work, Monte Carlo simulations using GEANT4 were written to compare ideal pure CsI and CsI(Tl) crystals and to study the effects of radiation damage on the performance of the Belle II electromagnetic calorimeter. / Graduate

Une architecture de capteurs à pixels CMOS permettant la désertion du volume sensible par polarisation via la face avant du circuit est étudiée à travers la caractérisation en laboratoire d’un capteur prototype. Les performances de collection de charge confirment la désertion d‘une grande partie de l’épaisseur sensible. De plus, le bruit de lecture restant modeste, le capteur présente une excellente résolution en énergie pour les photons en dessous de 20 keV à des températures positives. Ces résultats soulignent l’intérêt de cette architecture pour la spectroscopie des rayons X mous et pour la trajectométrie des particules chargées en milieu très radiatif. La profondeur sur laquelle le capteur est déserté est prédite par un modèle analytique simplifié et par des calculs par éléments finis. Une méthode d’évaluation de cette profondeur par mesure indirecte est proposée. Les mesures corroborent les prédictions concernant un substrat fin, très résistif, qui est intégralement déserté et un substrat moins résistif et mesurant 40 micromètres, qui est partiellement déserté sur 18 micromètres mais détecte correctement sur la totalité de l’épaisseur. Deux développements de capteurs destinés à l’imagerie X et à la neuro-imagerie intracérébrale sur des rats éveillés et libres de leurs mouvements sont présentés. / An architecture of CMOS pixel sensor allowing the depletion of the sensitive volume through frontside biasing is studied through the characterization in laboratory of a prototype. The charge collection performances confirm the depletion of a large part of the sensitive thickness. In addition, with a modest noise level, the sensor features an excellent energy resolution for photons below 20 keV at positive temperatures. These results demonstrate that such sensors are suited for soft X-ray spectroscopy and for charged particle tracking in highly radiative environment. A simplified analytical model and finite elements calculus are used to predict the depletion depth reached. An indirect measurement method to evaluate this depth is proposed. Measurements confirm predictions for a thin highly resistive epitaxial layer, which is fully depleted, and a 40micrometers thick bulk less resistive substrate, for which depletion reached 18 micrometers but which still offers correct detection over its full depth. Two sensor designs dedicated to X-ray imaging and in-brain neuroimaging on awake and freely moving rats are presented.