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Crystalline Materials for Radiation Detection: A New Perspectives

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A special issue of Crystals (ISSN 2073-4352). This special issue belongs to the section "Inorganic Crystalline Materials".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (10 August 2021) | Viewed by 17493

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Special Issue Editors

Dr. Ivana Capan

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Guest Editor

Institute Ruder Boskovic, Zagreb, Croatia
Interests: semiconductor crystals; defects; electronic devices; SiC
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Dr. José Coutinho

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Guest Editor

i3N, Department of Physics, University of Aveiro, Campus Santiago, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal
Interests: DFT; modelling; first principles calculations; semiconductors
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Dr. Vladimir Radulovic

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Guest Editor

Jozef Stefan Institute, Slovenia for nuclear reactors and radiation, Ljubljana, Slovenia
Interests: reactor physics; radiation; detection, neutrons

Dr. Takahiro Makino

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Guest Editor

National Institutes for Quantum and Radiological Science and Technology, Chiba, Japan
Interests: wide-bandgap semiconductors; devices; defects
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The development of efficient and environmentally-friendly technologies for radiation detection is a great challenge. Among the materials of present and future perspective are crystalline materials, wide-bandgap semiconductor crystals, in particular. The recent progress in crystal growth, theoretical modelling, understanding of radiation induced defects, and radiation hardness has offered a new perspectives for radiation detection.

This Special Issue of Crystals is dedicated to all aspects related to the growth, characterization, and applications of crystalline materials for radiation detection with the aim to provide an overview of the issues of current interest and future perspectives.

Researchers working in the field are invited to contribute. Potential topics of interest include but are not limited to the following:

Growth and characterization techniques of crystalline materials;
Radiation detection;
Wide-band gap semiconductors;
Radiation induced defects;
Modeling, first-principles calculations, etc.;
Deep level transient spectroscopy, electron paramagnetic resonanse, etc;

Dr. Ivana Capan
Dr. José Coutinho
Dr. Vladimir Radulovic
Dr. Takahiro Makino
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Crystals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

Crystalline materials
Semiconductor devices
Radiation detectors
Radiation induced defects
Wide-band gap semiconductors (GaN, SiC, et.)
Modeling, first-principles calculations
Radiation hardness

Published Papers (6 papers)

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Editorial

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2 pages, 160 KiB

Open AccessEditorial

Editorial for the Special Issue on “Crystalline Materials for Radiation Detection: A New Perspective”

by Ivana Capan, José Coutinho, Vladimir Radulović and Takahiro Makino

Crystals 2021, 11(8), 945; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11080945 - 14 Aug 2021

Viewed by 1132

Abstract

The development of efficient and environmentally friendly technologies for radiation detection is a great challenge [...] Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crystalline Materials for Radiation Detection: A New Perspectives)

Research

Jump to: Editorial

10 pages, 688 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Intensity of Radiative Recombination in the Germanium/Silicon Nanosystem with Germanium Quantum Dots

by Sergey I. Pokutnyi and Lucjan Jacak

Crystals 2021, 11(3), 275; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11030275 - 11 Mar 2021

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1943

Abstract

It is shown that in a germanium/silicon nanosystem with germanium quantum dots, the hole leaving the germanium quantum dot causes the appearance of the hole energy level in the bandgap energy in a silicon matrix. The dependences of the energies of the ground state of a hole and an electron are obtained as well as spatially indirect excitons on the radius of the germanium quantum dot and on the depth of the potential well for holes in the germanium quantum dot. It is found that as a result of a direct electron transition in real space between the electron level that is located in the conduction band of the silicon matrix and the hole level located in the bandgap of the silicon matrix, the radiative recombination intensity in the germanium/silicon nanosystem with germanium quantum dots increases significantly. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crystalline Materials for Radiation Detection: A New Perspectives)

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19 pages, 1903 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Theory of the Thermal Stability of Silicon Vacancies and Interstitials in 4H–SiC

by José Coutinho

Crystals 2021, 11(2), 167; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11020167 - 08 Feb 2021

Cited by 18 | Viewed by 3723

Abstract

This paper presents a theoretical study of the electronic and dynamic properties of silicon vacancies and self-interstitials in 4H–SiC using hybrid density functional methods. Several pending issues, mostly related to the thermal stability of this defect, are addressed. The silicon site vacancy and [...] Read more.

U

neutral state, which “disproportionates” into

V_{Si}^{+}

V_{Si}^{-}

, depending on the location of the Fermi level. The vacancy introduces a

(- / +)

transition, calculated at

E_{c} - 1.25 eV

, which determines a temperature threshold for the annealing of

V_{Si}

into CAV in n-type material due to a Fermi level crossing effect. Analysis of a configuration coordinate diagram allows us to conclude that

V_{Si}

anneals out in two stages—at low temperatures (

T ≲ 600

°C) via capture of a mobile species (e.g., self-interstitials) and at higher temperatures (

T ≳ 1200

°C) via dissociation into

V_{C}

and

C_{Si}

defects. The Si interstitial (

{Si}_{i}

) is also a negative-

U

defect, with metastable

q = + 1

and

q = + 3

states. These are the only paramagnetic states of the defect, and maybe that explains why it escaped detection, even in p-type material where the migration barriers are at least 2.7 eV high. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crystalline Materials for Radiation Detection: A New Perspectives)

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13 pages, 3414 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Response of 4H-SiC Detectors to Ionizing Particles

by Robert Bernat, Ivana Capan, Luka Bakrač, Tomislav Brodar, Takahiro Makino, Takeshi Ohshima, Željko Pastuović and Adam Sarbutt

Crystals 2021, 11(1), 10; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11010010 - 24 Dec 2020

Cited by 14 | Viewed by 2849

Abstract

We report the response of newly designed 4H-SiC Schottky barrier diode (SBD) detector prototype to alpha and gamma radiation. We studied detectors of three different active area sizes (1 × 1, 2 × 2 and 3 × 3 mm²), while all detectors had the same 4H-SiC epi-layer thickness of approximately µm, sufficient to stop alpha particles up to 6.8 MeV, which have been used in this study. The detector response to the various alpha emitters in the 3.27 MeV to 8.79 MeV energy range clearly demonstrates the excellent linear response to alpha emissions of the detectors with the increasing active area. The detector response in gamma radiation field of Co-60 and Cs-137 sources showed a linear response to air kerma and to different air kerma rates as well, up to 4.49 Gy/h. The detector response is not in saturation for the dose rates lower than 15.3 mGy/min and that its measuring range for gamma radiation with energies of 662 keV, 1.17 MeV and 1.33 MeV is from 0.5 mGy/h–917 mGy/h. No changes to electrical properties of pristine and tested 4H-SiC SBD detectors, supported by a negligible change in carbon vacancy defect density and no creation of other deep levels, demonstrates the radiation hardness of these 4H-SiC detectors. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crystalline Materials for Radiation Detection: A New Perspectives)

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11 pages, 2949 KiB

Open AccessArticle

The Interstitial Carbon–Dioxygen Center in Irradiated Silicon

by Marianna S. Potsidi, Navaratnarajah Kuganathan, Stavros-Richard G. Christopoulos, Alexander Chroneos, Theoharis Angeletos, Nicholas V. Sarlis and Charalampos A. Londos

Crystals 2020, 10(11), 1005; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst10111005 - 05 Nov 2020

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2021

Abstract

We investigated, experimentally as well as theoretically, defect structures in electron irradiated Czochralski-grown silicon (Cz-Si) containing carbon. Infrared spectroscopy (IR) studies observed a band at 1020 cm⁻¹ arisen in the spectra around 300 °C. Its growth occurs concomitantly with the decay out of the well-known vacancy-oxygen (VO) defect, with a Local Vibrational Mode (LVM) at 830 cm⁻¹ and carbon interstitial-oxygen interstitial (C_iO_i) defect with a LVM at 862 cm⁻¹, in silicon (Si). The main purpose of this work is to establish the origin of the 1020 cm⁻¹ band. One potential candidate is the carbon interstitial-dioxygen (C_iO_2i) defect since it is expected to form upon annealing out of the C_iO_i pair. To this end, systematic density functional theory (DFT) calculations were used to predict the lowest energy structure of the (C_iO_2i) defect in Si. Thereafter, we employed the dipole–dipole interaction method to calculate the vibrational frequencies of the structure. We found that C_iO_2i defect has an LVM at ~1006 cm⁻¹, a value very close to our experimental one. The analysis and study of the results lead us to tentatively correlate the 1020 cm⁻¹ band with the C_iO_2i defect. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crystalline Materials for Radiation Detection: A New Perspectives)

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16 pages, 3409 KiB

Open AccessEditor’s ChoiceArticle

Depth Profile Analysis of Deep Level Defects in 4H-SiC Introduced by Radiation

by Tomislav Brodar, Luka Bakrač, Ivana Capan, Takeshi Ohshima, Luka Snoj, Vladimir Radulović and Željko Pastuović

Crystals 2020, 10(9), 845; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst10090845 - 22 Sep 2020

Cited by 9 | Viewed by 4748

Abstract

Deep level defects created by implantation of light-helium and medium heavy carbon ions in the single ion regime and neutron irradiation in n-type 4H-SiC are characterized by the DLTS technique. Two deep levels with energies 0.4 eV (EH1) and 0.7 eV (EH3) below the conduction band minimum are created in either ion implanted and neutron irradiated material beside carbon vacancies (Z_1/2). In our study, we analyze components of EH1 and EH3 deep levels based on their concentration depth profiles, in addition to (−3/=) and (=/−) transition levels of silicon vacancy. A higher EH3 deep level concentration compared to the EH1 deep level concentration and a slight shift of the EH3 concentration depth profile to larger depths indicate that an additional deep level contributes to the DLTS signal of the EH3 deep level, most probably the defect complex involving interstitials. We report on the introduction of metastable M-center by light/medium heavy ion implantation and neutron irradiation, previously reported in cases of proton and electron irradiation. Contribution of M-center to the EH1 concentration profile is presented. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crystalline Materials for Radiation Detection: A New Perspectives)

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