Development of the Segmented Inverted Coaxial Germanium (SIGMA) Detector for Enhanced Gamma-Ray Spectroscopy and Imaging

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Nuclear physics seeks to answer fundamental science questions such as "How did the universe begin and how is it evolving? How are stars born? What are the fundamental constituents and fabric of the universe and how do they interact? How can we explore and understand the extremes of the universe?" The aim of this research is to develop new technology that will allow scientists from the UK and international nuclear physics communities to investigate and address these key questions. A new type of radiation detector will be developed, SIGMA, which will provide a major advance in performance over current state-of-the-art systems. The SIGMA detector will be able to locate gamma-ray interactions in space and time. This information will be used to track gamma-rays back to their point of origin, with unrivalled accuracy. The detector will be used alongside the AIDA system, which will detect another type of radiation, beta particles. This system is already under development by UK nuclear scientists at the Universities of Edinburgh and Liverpool and at STFC Daresbury Laboratory. Future nuclear physics experiments will combine the information from both detection systems to facilitate the collection of high-quality data at international facilities. This technique is set to significantly enhance these experiments, where as little as a few nuclei of interest are produced in a day.The long-term plan is that several SIGMA detectors will be deployed as part of the DESPEC experiment at the FAIR facility in Germany, where many UK scientists will conduct their research. In this experiment, the detectors will be used to measure key properties of nuclei that have never been observed before, to provide a deeper understanding of how stars are born and how they evolve. Development of the SIGMA detector is of high strategic importance to the STFC UK nuclear physics and is timely, with the FAIR facility coming online from 2019.A secondary aim of this research is to evaluate the suitability of the SIGMA detector for deployment as a gamma-ray imaging system for commercial and industrial applications. The detector would revolutionise performance in a variety of applications such as nuclear decommissioning, security, environmental monitoring and medical imaging. For example, using the detector in nuclear medicine would enhance quality of life and health through earlier diagnosis of cancer and neurological conditions. The detector could also be operated in national security and defence. For example, it could be used to image gamma-ray maps from spent fuel from nuclear reactors on board Royal Navy submarines. Data acquired from such a system would be used to inform models that underpin the safe design of future reactors.