Analytical modeling for gamma radiation damage on silicon photodiodes

Radiation-induced damage in PIN silicon photodiode induces degradation of the photodiode parameters. In this work, by presenting an analytical model, the effect of gamma dose on the dark current in a PIN photodiode array was investigated. Geant4 was used to obtain the damage constant as a result of primary incident particle fluence and NIEL distribution calculations. Experimental measurements as well as numerical simulation of the semiconductor with ATLAS were carried out to verify and parameterize the analytical model calculations. A reasonable agreement has been found between analytical results and experimental data for BPX65 silicon photodiodes irradiated by a Co-60 gamma source at total doses up to 500 krad under different reverse voltages. Moreover, the results showed that the dark current of each photodiode array pixel has considerably increased by gamma dose irradiation.