Study of electric field distribution and low frequency noise of CdZnTe radiation detectors

Abstract

Polarization phenomena in a metal-semiconductor-metal (M-S-M) structure of metallic Schottky contacts deposited on CdZnTe radiation detectors were studied. We evaluate the distribution of the electric field along the biased M-S-M structure by Pockels measurements. The results show that almost all the electric field is developed across the depletion layer of the reverse-biased contact. The noise measurements of the CdZnTe detectors studied show that the dominant noise is 1/fm noise. The 1/fm noise, with the parameter m close to one, is present at frequencies below 100 Hz and its bandwidth decreases in the course of the polarization process. At higher frequencies, we observed an increase of the m parameter to 2, which indicates a strengthened effect of the generation-recombination processes. In the frequency band of dominating 1/fm = 1 noise, the increase of magnitude of the noise spectral density was proportional to the power of 6, in relation to the current through the detector. This high value is explained as a result of a screening effect of the space charge buildup during the polarization.© 2013 IOP Publishing Ltd and Sissa Medialab srl.