Amorphous silicon based particle detectors

Radiation hard monolithic particle sensors can be fabricated by a vertical integration of amorphous silicon particle sensors on top of CMOS readout chip. Two types of such particle sensors are presented here using either thick diodes or microchannel plates. The first type based on amorphous silicon diodes exhibits high spatial resolution due to the short lateral carrier collection. Combination of an amorphous silicon thick diode with microstrip detector geometries permits to achieve micrometer spatial resolution beneficial for high accuracy beam positioning. Microchannel plates based on amorphous silicon were successfully fabricated and multiplication of electrons was observed. This material may solve some of the problems related to conventional microchannel devices. Issues, potential and limits of these detectors are presented and discussed. © 2011 Materials Research Society.