Evaluating the possible degradation of extremely thin silicon detectors within a gas jet target environment

¹ Instituto de Física, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 04510, Mexico City, Mexico
² Facultad de Ciencias Experimentales, Universidad de Huelva, 21071, Huelva, Spain
³ Instituto de Estructura de la Materia, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 28006 Madrid, Spain.

^* e-mail: fabiolasilva@estudiantes.fisica.unam.mx
^** e-mail: luis.acosta@csic.es

Published online: 1 August 2025

Abstract

The SUGAR system (SUpersoni GAs jet-taRget) is a device which may reach an ultrathin and pure gas target. The main idea of SUGAR is to use a particle detection array inside its scattering chamber in order to study interesting reactions at low energy. In this direction, it is essential to evaluate the behaviour of thin silicon detectors surrounding the jet while it circulates, considering the turbulence expected due to its supersonic nature. One of the variables to control the possible damage of the silicon surface is the resolution, this should get worse if the turbulent gas is causing some effect on it.

With this in mind, in this work we present the results obtained from the analysis of three different types of silicon detectors: a thick Passivated Implanted Planar silicon detector, a extremely thin surface barrier detector and a very thin Double-Sided Silicon Strip Detector. Such devices were tested for a number of hours inside the jet environment, controlling every time the detector behaviour, by using radioactive sources and their spectroscopic data. The results obtained are a first glimpse about the very acceptable possibilities to use thin detectors, thin strip detectors and telescopes inside the SUGAR scattering chamber.