Abstract
Measurements of the temperature dependence of the dark current for standard commercial photomultipliers with multialkali photocathodes (type S20) have been contrasted with data from new prototype tubes with greatly enhanced long wavelength performance. The analyses suggest that for the larger structures part of the cathode is closer to a bialkali composition. This reduces the activation energy of the dark current from ∼1.1 eV for normal S20 cathodes down to ∼0.8 eV. Many tubes show a lower activation energy component near 0.6 eV which may represent a sensitization process from monolayers of molecular oxygen. Similarly, monolayers of water can play a significant role, but do so by reducing cathode sensitivity. Several tubes display a sharp transition in gain at the limiting temperature for water desorption (i.e. a sublimation transition). The commercial structured cathodes can show evidence for up to 70% improvements in quantum efficiency by operation at low temperature which can be immediately exploited. Prototype tubes with greatly improved performance were studied but for very small area illumination spots there can be problems of local variations in gain and wavelength response across the structural features of pyramidal modified cathode windows. Overall the data suggest that not only is improved performance already available with existing photomultiplier tubes but also with structured photocathode windows, and/or the introduction of surface ‘defects’ in the window, even further improvements are feasible.
Published Version
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