Compact Boron-Filled 3D Semiconductor Neutron Detector Module

A Neutron detection device is an indispensable tool for Homeland Security, defense, power and medical applications. The proliferation of weapons of mass destruction such as nuclear weapons is a serious threat in today's world. Low cost, low power, high performance, rugged and portable neutron detection devices are highly desirable for these applications. Yet, the cost and production volume of the traditional He-3 tube based neutron detector are greatly limited by the availability of He-3 rare gas. Agiltron proposes an unprecedented fabrication and integration approach to make a boron-10 filled micro-fabricated 3D solid-state neutron detector, which, with performance comparable to He-3 tubes, can be commercially manufactured at low cost for large-scale deployment and will replace the LiI detector used in current personal radiation detectors (PRD). Our success in Phase I will demonstrate the feasibility of key fabrication steps and provided a rationale for carrying out the detector module development in Phase II, which will further lead to the large-scale manufacture of these next generation neutron detectors.