Investigating the response of single-pad and hybrid pixel detectors (Si, GaAs, CdTe, CdZnTe) for 226Ra and 137Cs

Abstract The development of hybrid pixel detectors for particle detection with high spatial resolution in high energy physics experiments has spun off a number of developments with applications in imaging, especially biomedical imaging, imaging in X-ray astronomy and medicine. The energy resolution and cluster size of the pixel detector depends on applied voltage, the comparison between the pixel detector and the pad detector is neglected in the literature. The purpose of this work is to compare the characteristics of the pixel and single-pad detectors made of three semiconductor materials (Si, GaAs and CdTe) under the same conditions using alpha and gamma rays. This paper studies in more detail the energy resolution, cluster size and signal magnitude of three pixel detectors made of Si, GaAs, CdTe and compares the applied voltage dependence of four types of pad detectors made of Si, GaAs:Cr, CdTe and CdZnTe(CZT) using 226 Ra and 137 Cs radioactive sources. The results concerning dependence of energy resolution, cluster size and signal magnitude on applied voltage are presented for pixel detectors and pad detectors. The goal of these work is a refined and structured comparison of semiconductor detectors, focusing on energy resolution and key selection criteria to help users choose the best detector for their specific task (e.g., X-ray spectroscopy, particle physics, synchrotron applications).