CVD diamond detectors for neutron spectroscopy at the NIF

Greg Schmid
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
July 23, 2002

Abstract:
Chemical vapor deposition (CVD) diamond is a synthetic, polycrystalline, material grown in the lab. Due to improvements in growth technology, the electrical quality of CVD diamond has improved by over 3 orders of magnitude since 1990, and is now better than natural diamond. This has lead to the construction of radiation detectors based on CVD diamond. Such detectors are very fast (sub nanosecond) and have a high degree of radiation hardness. We have been exploring the possible application of CVD diamond detectors to neutron spectroscopy at the NIF. In what follows, we discuss four prototype detectors that have been fabricated. Neutron data acquired at the OMEGA laser fusion facility (Rochester, NY) will be presented.