Role of guard rings in improving the performance of silicon detectors

BARC has developed large-area silicon detectors in collaboration with BEL to be used in the pre-shower detector of the CMS experiment at CERN. The use of floating guard rings (FGR) in improving breakdown voltage and reducing leakage current of silicon detectors is well-known. In the present work, it has been demonstrated that FGRs can also be used to improve the spectroscopic response of silicon detectors. The results have been confirmed by carrying outα-particle (≈5 MeV) andγ-ray (60 keV) spectroscopies with the FGR floating or biased and the underlying physics aspect behind the change in spectra is explained. Although reduction in leakage current after biasing one of the guard rings has been reported earlier, the role of a guard ring in improving the spectroscopic response is reported for the first time. Results of TCAD simulations for silicon detectors with the guard ring under different biasing conditions have been presented. Low yield in producing large-area silicon detectors makes them very costly. However, with one of the FGRs biased even a detector having large surface leakage current can be used to give the same response as a very good detector. This makes the use of large-area silicon detectors very economical as the yield would be very high (>90%).