IONIZING DOSE RATES

THE EFFECTS OF IONIZING RADIATION ON DIELECTRIC CONDUCTIVITY HAVE BEEN EXTENSIVELY STUDIED BY MANY RESEARCHERS. MUCH DATA EXIST IN THE LITERATURE FOR MATERIALS SUCH AS TEFLON, POLYETHYLENE, TANTALUM, ETC., WHICH ARE COMMONLY USED THROUGHOUT THE ELECTRONICS INDUSTRY. A NEED EXISTS TO COLLECT AND CHARACTERIZE THESE DATA IN ORDER TO DETERMINE WHAT ADDITIONAL MEASUREMENTS ARE REQUIRED TO COMPLETE THE SET. PREVIOUS EXPERIMENTS HAVE DEMONSTRATED A DEPENDENCE ON PHOTON ENERGY, TEMPERATURE, PRESSURE, BIAS, AND PREVIOUS HISTORY OF THE MATERIAL. IN ADDITION, EXPERIMENTAL TECHNIQUES CAN RESULT IN LARGE MEASUREMENT ERRORS DUE TO SPACECHARGE EFFECTS UNLESS CAREFULLY DESIGNED AND CONTROLLED TESTS ARE CONDUCTED. DURING THE PHASE I EFFORT, A CATALOG OF EXISTING DATA WILL BE PRODUCED BASED UPON A DETAILED LITERATURE SEARCH. THE DATA WILL BE CHARACTERIZED AND MISSING DATA IDENTIFIED. SINCE RADIATION-INDUCED DIELECTRIC CONDUCTIVITY CANNOT BE EASILY COMPUTED FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES, A NEW SERIES OF TESTS WILL BE DESIGNED THAT INCORPORATE TECHNIQUES TO ACCOUNT FOR SPACECHARGE EFFECTS AND PRELIMINARY HARDWARE WILL BE FABRICATED TO VALIDATE THE CONCEPTS. THEN, DURING PHASE II, AN EXTENSIVE SERIES OF TESTS WILL BE CONDUCTED TO COMPLETE THE DATA SET OF DIELECTRIC CONDUCTIVITY EFFECTS UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF IONIZING RADIATION.