Diamond detectors for synchrotron radiation X-ray applications

Due to its unique physical properties, diamond is a very appealing material for the development of electronic devices and sensors. Its wide band gap (5.5 eV) endows diamond based devices with low thermal noise, low dark current levels and, in the case of radiation detectors, high visible-to-X-ray signal discrimination (visible blindness) as well as high sensitivity to energies greater than the band gap. Furthermore, due to its radiation hardness diamond is very interesting for applications in extreme environments, or as monitor of high fluency radiation beams. In this work the use of diamond based detectors for X-ray sensing is discussed. On purpose, some photo-conductors based on different diamond types have been tested at the DAFNE-L synchrotron radiation laboratory at Frascati. X-ray sensitivity spectra, linearity and stability of the response of these diamond devices have been measured in order to evidence the promising performance of such devices. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V All rights reserved.