Development of the Calibration System and Characterization of the Avalanche Photodiode for Scintillation Detection

Abstract

Branches of physics and application technologies have widely utilized avalanche photodiodes (APDs) by coupling of scintillators with advantages of multiplication process and effective photosensitivity in a wide range of visible light wavelength. In addition, to meet the requirements for the purpose of each experiment, various types of APDs have been developed. The calibration system and characteristics of APD were constructed and studied by comparing several calibration methods. Electronics calibration is presented with charge injection and quantum efficiency (QE)-calibrated photodiode. By utilizing visible light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and with conventional electronic characteristics and a scintillation crystal with <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">22</sup> Na radioactive source, the APD gain was measured. Furthermore, the following were measured from the calibration method: QE, excess noise factor, and noise level. In this article, we compare our test results with one another, which are provided in the datasheet presented by the manufacturer, and discuss the possibility of standardizing the characterization of APDs by this calibration system.