The response of low-cost photodiodes for dosimetry in electron beam processing

The response of thin diodes (SFH206k) as dosimeters has been investigated employing the beam of an electron accelerator within the dose rate range of 2–8 kGy/s and accumulated doses up to 100 kGy. These devices, operating in the short-circuit mode and under industrial irradiation conditions, deliver current signals nonlinearly dependent on the dose rate, whichever the dose history of the diodes, due to the high density of the generated electron-hole pairs herein achieved. Despite this nonlinearity, the dose rate response is stable and characterized by current signals with repeatability better than 2.0%, regardless of the accumulated dose. It is also found that the dose responses are quite linear with sensitivities slightly dependent on the accumulated dose at a constant dose rate. The decrease in the charge sensitivity, taking as reference that obtained before any radiation damage, reaches only 9% (k = 2) at 100 kGy, which is much smaller than the values reported in the literature. From this low aging and the repeatability of both dose rate and dose responses, it seems that the photodiode under investigation is a low budget alternative, good enough for routine dosimetry, provided it has been previously calibrated in the same processing facility.