Student Major/Year in School
Mechanical Engineering
Faculty Mentor Information
Dr. Douglas McGregor, Department of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering, College of Engineering, Kansas State University
Abstract
The world is in need of a new way to detect neutrons. The best current detectors rely on 3He, which is in short supply. The 3He detectors are extremely expensive. The goal of this project is to produce inexpensive and robust detectors that do not rely on 3He. Instead of using gas, the Dual Sided Microstructured Neutron Detectors (DS-MSNDs) are made from a semiconductor material. The DS-MSNDs have been simulated to have up to 70% efficiency, which is comparable to the 3He detectors efficiency of about 80%. The DS-MSNDs have micro-trenches that are back filled with 6LiF, a neutron reactive material. Trenches for the devices are created using standard VLSI processes and techniques. Over the past year, small changes have been made to the manufacturing process to yield more consistent results in the trench depths, packing fraction, and intrinsic neutron detection efficiency. Some of the changes made to the manufacturing process are etching times, particle size of the 6LiF, and packing techniques. The best detectors are taken and tested with a Californium-252 source to find out the intrinsic neutron detection efficiency. The efficiency is found by comparing the counts taken by the device and comparing that value to another device with a known efficiency. The highest efficiency a device has achieved is 69.2%.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
Recommended Citation
Medina, Jared (2019). "Manufacture of Dual Sided Microstructured Semiconductor Neutron Detectors," Kansas State University Undergraduate Research Conference. https://newprairiepress.org/ksuugradresearch/2019/posters/58
Manufacture of Dual Sided Microstructured Semiconductor Neutron Detectors
The world is in need of a new way to detect neutrons. The best current detectors rely on 3He, which is in short supply. The 3He detectors are extremely expensive. The goal of this project is to produce inexpensive and robust detectors that do not rely on 3He. Instead of using gas, the Dual Sided Microstructured Neutron Detectors (DS-MSNDs) are made from a semiconductor material. The DS-MSNDs have been simulated to have up to 70% efficiency, which is comparable to the 3He detectors efficiency of about 80%. The DS-MSNDs have micro-trenches that are back filled with 6LiF, a neutron reactive material. Trenches for the devices are created using standard VLSI processes and techniques. Over the past year, small changes have been made to the manufacturing process to yield more consistent results in the trench depths, packing fraction, and intrinsic neutron detection efficiency. Some of the changes made to the manufacturing process are etching times, particle size of the 6LiF, and packing techniques. The best detectors are taken and tested with a Californium-252 source to find out the intrinsic neutron detection efficiency. The efficiency is found by comparing the counts taken by the device and comparing that value to another device with a known efficiency. The highest efficiency a device has achieved is 69.2%.
