Luminescence centers in proton irradiated single crystal CVD diamond

Diamond displays a large variety of luminescence centers which define its optical properties and can be either created or modified by irradiation. The main purpose of the present work is to study the radiation hardness of several of such centers in homoepitaxial single-crystal CVD diamond by following the evolution of photoluminescence and ionoluminescence upon 2 MeV proton irradiation. Luminescence decays were observed with values of the fluence at half of the starting luminescence (FIR) of the order of 10(14) cm(-2). The 3H center displayed a non-monotonic behavior, with a growing behavior and a subsequent decay with a rather high F(1/2) value (in the order of few a 10(16) cm(-2)), maintaining at the highest fluences an intensity significantly higher than the blue A-band. A simple model based on a double-exponential trend was defined to fit with satisfactory accuracy the evolution of the 3H center. Several PL centers (namely: 3H, TR12.491 nm and 494 nm) exhibited clear correlations and anti-correlations in their fluence dependences, which were considered in the attempt to acquire some insight into their possible alternative attributions. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.