Characterization of a Silicon Drift Detector for High-Resolution Electron Spectroscopy

TL;DR

This paper characterizes a Silicon Drift Detector's performance for electron detection in the keV range, emphasizing the importance of detector modeling for accurate beta-decay spectrum reconstruction.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed characterization of a single-pixel SDD for electron detection and highlights the impact of entrance window structure on energy response.

Findings

SDD effectively detects electrons from a few keV to tens of keV

Entrance window structure significantly influences energy response

A detailed detector model is essential for spectrum reconstruction

Abstract

Silicon Drift Detectors, widely employed in high-resolution and high-rate X-ray applications, are considered here with interest also for electron detection. The accurate measurement of the tritium beta decay is the core of the TRISTAN (TRitium Investigation on STerile to Active Neutrino mixing) project. This work presents the characterization of a single-pixel SDD detector with a mono-energetic electron beam obtained from a Scanning Electron Microscope. The suitability of the SDD to detect electrons, in the energy range spanning from few keV to tens of keV, is demonstrated. Experimental measurements reveal a strong effect of the detector's entrance window structure on the observed energy response. A detailed detector model is therefore necessary to reconstruct the spectrum of an unknown beta-decay source.