Effect of detector crystal size on Compton suppression factors

Abstract

The geometrical parameters which affect the suppression factor for an HPGe (High Purity Germanium)-NaI Compton suppression spectrometer were studied by a Monte Carlo simulation with the EGS4 system. The spectrums were crated for 5 energy values ranging from 200 keV to 2 MeV. Compton suppression factors (CSFs), the parameters characterizing the system performance, were calculated for different HPGe crystal parameters. It was observed that to obtain better Compton suppressed factors, a laboratory must choose as small HPGe crystal as possible for energy values up to 400 keV. However, for higher energies up to 2 MeV, larger HPGe crystals provide better Compton suppression systems. These findings suggest that the choice of HPGe crystal size can significantly impact the performance of a Compton suppression spectrometer and should be carefully considered in its design and optimization.