Copper iodide semiconductor: a non-hygroscopic, bright red-emitting scintillator for X-ray and gamma-ray detection

Abstract

In this work, the inverse temperature crystallization and scintillation properties of a copper iodide (CuI) semiconductor is presented. Single crystal of a CuI is very attractive for X- and gamma-ray de-tection applications due to non-hygroscopic and excellent light yield with long-wavelength emission in the red. The grown crystal shows almost colorless and transparent feature and exhibits a red emis-sion band peaking at 730 nm with a fluorescence quantum efficiency (QE) of 43% under excitation at 416 nm. The photoluminescence (PL) decay time constant was estimated to be approximately 175 ns (20 %) and 2507 ns (80 %) using an exponential fitting. The X-ray excited scintillation band appeared near the wavelength of 720 nm. The scintillation light yield reached 80,000 photons/MeV compared with a CsI:Tl commercial scintillator.

Photoluminescence and Radioluminescence Properties of Y3Al5O12 Doped with 3d-Transition Metal Ions

“…Although many scintillators have been studied in the last few decades, (4)(5)(6)(7) fundamental studies on novel scintillators still continue to achieve better performance than ever before. There have been reports on various types of scintillator, such as single crystals, (8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(21) nanocrystals, (22) crystalline films, (23) ceramics, (24)(25)(26)(27) glasses, (28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37) plastics, (38) and organic-inorganic hybrid materials, (39)(40)(41)(42) even in the last few years. In terms of the luminescent center, specific dopants such as Ce, Eu, and Tl have been mainly used for commercial scintillators; however, other dopants are also of our interest.…”

Photoluminescence and scintillation properties of Pr-doped (Lu, Y)2Si2O7 crystals

“…6) The required properties for the scintillators vary for each application; however, high emission efficiency, fast decay, and low afterglow are generally important as scintillation properties. To explore the scintillators which satisfy the above requirements, various types of scintillators such as single crystals, [7][8][9][10] ceramics, [11][12][13] glasses, [14][15][16] and liquids [17][18][19] have been researched.…”

Optical and scintillation properties of Lumilass-G and -R glasses

“…In terms of material forms in scintillators, bulk single crystal, [16][17][18] transparent ceramic, [19][20][21] and glass [22][23][24] materials have been mainly used. To achieve a high detection efficiency, bulk form is important in most scintillation detectors.…”