A compensated fission detector based on photovoltaic cells

Standard techniques of event-by-event detection of fission may fail when operated in high γ-ray or particle radiation environments. This is the case within the 800 MeV proton-driven lead slowing-down neutron spectrometer at LANSCE where standard fission detectors are found to be inoperable for microseconds to milliseconds after each proton pulse. To overcome this problem, a simple fission fragment detector based on compensated photovoltaic cells has been developed. The compensated detector has lower susceptibility to the strong γ-flash and can recover much faster than an uncompensated detector. This detector is well adapted to applications involving the detection of fission in regions where high intensity γ-ray and/or particle radiation fields exist.