Researchers from the NanoMatMicro group, from the Institute of Materials Science of Seville (ICMS), belonging to cicCartuja, in collaboration with scientists from the National Accelerators Centre (CNA), have managed to apply a solid material composed of silicon and helium for use as targets in Nuclear Physics experiments.
This material, in the form of a thin film deposited on a substrate, is made up of a solid matrix of amorphous silicon containing nanobubbles, where a large amount of helium is housed in a condensed state. It is this high concentration of helium, in addition to its stability under irradiation with ion beams, which has led to the material, manufactured at the ICMS, being proposed as “solid He targets” in model Nuclear Physics experiments carried out at the CNA facilities.
The manufacture of this material has been achieved thanks to cathodic sputtering technology, which is characterized by its easy scaling and great versatility. Another of its advantages is that it is stable for years under ambient conditions and can even be heated to temperatures of hundreds of degrees without altering its properties.
The application of this methodology to different trapped materials and gases, designing and manufacturing targets tailored for specific experiments, has sparked interest in various European laboratories and facilities in a novel and multidisciplinary line of work. The availability of gases such as helium in a condensed state and high concentrations, without resorting to gas cells or condensates at low temperatures, provides a great advantage in the design of these experiments.
The promising results of this work have been jointly patented by the CSIC and the University of Seville and have been published in the ACS Omega journal, belonging to the American Chemical Society. The article has also received funding within the “Post-grant OpenAIRE FP7” pilot program for “full Open Access” publications, and has been proposed as part of a “Life Slides” presentation on the ACS Omega website.
More information at: Characterization and Validation of a-Si Magnetron-Sputtered Thin Films as Solid He Targets with High Stability for Nuclear Reactions. Vanda Godinho, Francisco Javier Ferrer, Begoña Fernández, Jaime Caballero-Hernández, Joaquin Gómez-Camacho, Asunción Fernández. ACS Omega 2016, Vol. 1, 1229−1238. DOI: 10.1021/acsomega.6b0027
ACS Live Slides: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/suppl/10.1021/acsomega.6b00270