Improvement of the performance of a Compton-suppression spectrometer by minimizing the dead layer of the central Ge detector

Abstract

The performance of a Compton-suppression spectrometer is investigated for two different Ge crystals as central detector; a 126 cm3 Ge(Li) with a dead layer of 1.0 mm and a 90 cm3 HPGe with a dead layer of 0.22 mm. The thin dead layer HPGe gives a 32% improvement in the overall Compton suppression. Predictions of the influence of the dead-layer thickness by means of Monte Carlo calculations are in good agreement. The spectrometer is further tested with radioactive sources of 88Y and 152Eu and the in-beam reaction 24Mg + (45 MeV)16O.