Demonstration and aging test of a radiation resistant strontium-90 betavoltaic mechanism

In this work, a betavoltaic combined with photovoltaic mechanism using strontium-90 as a radioactive source was built up. A transparent yttrium aluminum garnet ceramic doped with a cerium ion is used as an intermediate conversion layer to avoid direct irradiation to a semiconductor conversion device...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Applied physics letters 2020-04, Vol.116 (15)
Main Authors: Lei, Yisong, Yang, Yuqing, Li, Gang, Liu, Yebing, Xu, Jian, Xiong, Xiaoling, Luo, Shunzhong, Peng, Taiping
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aluminum
Applied physics
Beta particles
Beta rays
Cerium
Circuits
Crystal structure
Crystallinity
Electron beams
Electron irradiation
Open circuit voltage
Photovoltaic cells
Photovoltaic conversion
Radiation tolerance
Short circuit currents
Silicon
Yttrium
Yttrium-aluminum garnet
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Summary:In this work, a betavoltaic combined with photovoltaic mechanism using strontium-90 as a radioactive source was built up. A transparent yttrium aluminum garnet ceramic doped with a cerium ion is used as an intermediate conversion layer to avoid direct irradiation to a semiconductor conversion device and translates most of the high energy beta particles into photons. The traditional crystalline silicon conversion device with an N+PP+ junction structure functions as a betavoltaic and photovoltaic conversion device simultaneously. Radiation resistance is demonstrated by a 0.9 MeV electron beam irradiation aging experiment. In the optimized betavoltaic setup with a 0.5 mm transparent yttrium aluminum garnet ceramic, the crystalline silicon conversion device can bear 5 × 1015 e/cm2 by degrading output power less than 15%. Loaded with 1.3 mCi strontium-90, this betavoltaic setup produces a short circuit current of 282 nA, an open circuit voltage of 0.168 V, a fill factor of 0.58, and a total conversion efficiency of 0.32%.
ISSN:0003-6951
1077-3118
DOI:10.1063/1.5140780