Study of radioactive impurities in neutron transmutation doped germanium

Abstract

A program to develop low temperature (mK) sensors with neutron transmutation doped Ge for rare event studies with a cryogenic bolometer has been initiated. For this purpose, semiconductor grade Ge wafers are irradiated with thermal neutron flux from Dhruva reactor at Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), Mumbai. Spectroscopic studies of irradiated samples have revealed that the environment of the capsule used for irradiating the sample leads to significant levels of 65Zn, 110mAg and 182Ta impurities, which can be reduced by chemical etching of approximately ~50μm thick surface layer. From measurements of the etched samples in the low background counting setup, activity due to trace impurities of 123Sb in bulk Ge is estimated to be ~1Bq/g after irradiation. These estimates indicate that in order to use the NTD Ge sensors for rare event studies, a cooldown period of ~2 years would be necessary to reduce the radioactive background to ≤1mBq/g.