Re: [amsat-bb] gamma ray detector

[Mike Murphree <mike@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Friday, November 29, 2002, at 08:10  AM, Bob Bruninga wrote:

> On Fri, 29 Nov 2002, Mike Murphree wrote about Radiation Detectors:
>
>> Also from EE Times recently, see:
>> http://www.eetimes.com/at/news/OEG20021125S0055
>
> We quickly need a radiation detector for our next satellite so that we 
> can
> tell the radiation dose being received by some sample high-tech solar
> cells.  And the above article is about making "diodes" BIG enough so 
> that
> they have a chance of getting hit.... caused me to ask:
>
> ? Since a big solar arrary is a HUGE surface of PN junctions, why 
> wouldnt
> there be a "spike" each time a "particle event" hit the cell.  To 
> detect
> that, all you would need is an AC coupled amplifier watching the PV 
> bus.?
>

We use reverse biased PIN diode junctions followed by a transimpedance 
amplifier
to detect laser radiation at work.  One source of such devices would be
Hamamatsu, http://usa.hamamatsu.com/ .  They won't sell to the military 
market,
but space applications should be okay.  Another interesting technology 
is the
Avalanche Photo Detector (APD).  We've never used any of these to 
detect nuclear
radiation sources though...

Mike W4LNA

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