IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MAGNETICS, VOL. MAG-23, NO.

2, MARCH 1987 469

ACOUSTIC DETECTIONOF SINGLE PARTICLES

FOR NEUTRINO EXPERIMENTS AND DARK MATTER SEARCHES
B. Neuhauser, B. Cabrera, C.J. Martoff, and B. A. Young-
Physics Department, Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305

Abstract
We are developingan entirely new type of particle detector,
called a silicon crystal acoustic detector (SiCAD), which senses
ballistic phonons generated when an incident particle collides with
a
nucleus or electron in a cube of crystalline silicon. For events
which deposit energy greater than about 1 keV, a 1 kg SiCAD
wouldhave spatial resolution better than 1 mm3 andenergy
resolution better than 100 eV. We describe our laboratory research
utilizingcarbonthermistors,superconductingtransitionedge
devices, and superconducting tunnel junctions as phonon sensors
on the crystal faces. Figure 1. Phonon energy density incident on[loo] faces of silicon
cube frompoint event at xJa = 0.7, y/a = 0.5 and zla = 0.4 .
Introduction
We have considered several phonon sensorconfigurations for
Semiconductor diode particle detectors presently offer the the surface readout. The most promising is an array of 64 parallel
highest energy resolution (3 keV FWHM for 1 kg) and the lowest strips on each face, with parallel faces having parallel strips (Figure
thresholds available(4 keV). In this energy range less than30% of 2). This scheme provides spatial resolution based on the intensity
the deposited energy is c,onverted directly into the electron-hole and arrival time profiles across the sensors on each face. The
pairs which produce the observed signal. The rest of the energy is sensors on the frontand back faces perpendicular to the x (y and z)
lost in the formof phonons with energies that are a factor of lo3 axis have theirsensors parallel to the z (x and y)axis and thus can
below the -1eV required to excite an electron-hole pair. In this be used to determine the y (z and x) coordinate of the event
paper we describe a new type of particle detector which directly location. I
senses the phononsgenerated by a scattering event. Recent work
on bolometers, which detect thermal phonons, has demonstrated
an energy resolution of 30 eV and a threshold of 30 eV by
measuringthetemperature rise in asmall ( g ) ultra-lowheat
capacity sensor1. B. Cabrera, L. Krauss andF. Wilczek suggested
scaling such bolometersup to a mass of 1 kg 2.
Motivated by this suggestion, B. Cabrera, C. J. Martoff, and
B. Neuhauser proposed direct sensingof ballistic phonons created
by a scattering event in a large insulating single crystal 3. Since
this wavefront carries information on the event total energy and
location within these silicon crystal acoustic detectors (SiCADs), as
well as possible information on the incident particle direction,
substantial improvementsin background rejectionare possible over
detection schemes which measure total energy deposition only. We
note thata threshold of 1 keV or betteris important for ourprimary
interest in using SiCADs as neutrino detectors.'
Figure 2. Phonon sensor configuration with parallel sensors on
Ballistic Phonons from Point Events in Crystal Cubes each face (12 shown).
When energy is deposited in a well localized volume withina The phonon energy flux intensities incident on each of 384 the
single crystal of silicon, a thermal-like phonon spectral distribution strips for the event location in Figure 1 is shown in Figure 3.
is generated with a characteristic temperature of 10-20 K. This Sharp peaks in each of the face intensity profiles locate the event
to
spectrum arises fromthe rapid decayof electron-hole excitations to better than the width of a sensor, and there is always at least one
the band edge. That process first creates very short wavelength sensor with an intensity greater than 2% of the total energy in the
phonons which quickly relaxto longer wavelength phonons within event. The lower two rows in Figure 3 show the time evolutionfor
10 nsec. Because the decay ratesare very strongly dependent upon the peak channel on each face. The time difference on opposing
phonon energy (-v 5), further decays are entirely negligible for faces also provides position information along that axis through the
phonons with wavelengths of several hundred lattice spacings. relation xi= a/2 - (Tia-Tio)V/2,where (Tia-Tio) is the difference in
These longer wavelength phonons propagate throughout the crystal arrival times at the xi = 0 and the xi= a faces. We have chosena =
with no scattering and no dispersion in the so-called ballistic
phonon mode4. 7.5 cm, corresponding to a 1 kg silicon cube.
Strong focussingeffects within the crystal distort the ballistic For a 1keV energy threshold for event detection within a 1 kg
phonon wavefronts and thereby causedistinctive phonon patterns SiCAD cube (this is necessary to detect neutrino-nucleuselastic
to be projected onto each face of a cube cut with its faces scattering), eachparallel strip sensormusthave an energy
orthogonal to the principal axes of the crystal. A Monte Carlo sensitivity of2% of 1 keV E 20 eV.
simulation is shown in Figure 1 for phonons create by a 1 keV
energy deposition at a point within a silicon crystal $. It is clear Suuerconducting Tunnel Junctions as Phonon Detectors
that high resolution information is available regarding the event
location and the particle trajectory. Themostpromisingsensorsforhighsensitivityphonon
detection are superconducting tunnel junctions, which have been
used for many years in condensed matter experiments studying
Manuscript Received September 30, 1986. phonon'focussing .' Our proposed applicationas aSiCAD readout
0018-9464/87/0300-0469$01.00@1987 IEEE
470
2 FACES X FACES Y FACES
(y coord.) (z coord.)
.......... ........... ............
1S.181
0 50 0 50 0 50
CCHC
HAH
A
NAN
NNN
ENE
LELL
X FACES Y FACES 2 FACES
- 2
Figure 3. Simulated signals for64channelsperfaceinthe
configuration of Figure2 for event location of Figure1.
is shown schematically in Figure 4. The junctions are formed by
deposition of a 200 nm thick aluminum film directly onto the
surface of the silicon cube, followed by growth of a thin oxide
tunnel barrier (1-2 nm thick) and finally deposition of an aluminum
outer film. Phonons from an event within the cube reach the
surface and enter the aluminum. Once inside the superconductior,
phononswithenergygreaterthan 2A (where A is the
superconductingenergygap)arestronglyabsorbedbybreaking
Voltage Bias
t t
Current Pulse Signal
Figure 4. Schematic of superconducting tunnel junctions used as
phonon sensors at crystal surfaces.
Cooperpairsandformingelectron-likeexcitationscalled
quasiparticles. For phonon energies well above threshold, several
Cooperpairswill be dissociated. If the device is cooled to
temperature T < 0.1 Tc (T < 100 mK for aluminum), there are
essentiallyno thermally generated quasiparticlespresentto
recombine with the signal quasiparticles.
Recently several European groups have reported energy
sensitivities ofa few keV and resolution of -30 eV for the
detection of low energy X-rays interacting directly in small area
(100pm x 100pm) tunnel junctions 5,6, This sensitivity already is
sufficient for our detection threshold requirement of 1 keV in1 kg
a
SiCAD. However, the area of each parallel strip sensor in Figure 2
is 0.88 cm2, a factor of -104 greater. We are pursuing several
techniques for obtaining comparable energy sensitivity in these
much largerarea tunnel junctions.
Ballistic Phonon Timing Experiment with Carbon Thermistor
To test the feasibility of using timing information from a
ballistic phonon wavefront for determining an event location, we
have experimented with phonons propagating in an ultracold single
crystal silicon rod 7 . We use a dilution refrigerator operating
continuously below 12 mK and a cerium magnesium nitrate (CMN)
paramagnetic salt demagnetization cell cooled below 2 mK.
The experimental setup, shown schematically in Figure 5, is
composed of a cylindrical silicon crystal (length8.9 cm, diameter
,dl1......
..................
0.5 cm, axis [loo] ) mounted in the CMN cell containing liquid
3He at a pressure of379 kPa. The temperature is measured with a
cerium lanthanum magnesium nitrate (CLMN) pill coupled to a
SQUID magnetometer. Ballistic phonon bursts are created by
applying 785 nm 500 mW laser diode pulses of100 nsec duration
to one end of the rod through an optical fiber.
SILICON CRYSTAL
GOLD ELECTRODES
PENCIL LEAD FILM
-.- SILVERWIRES
Figure 5. Schematic of ballistic phonon timing experiment.
The phonon sensor is a carbon film of the type developed by
Meissner, et a1 8. It is a thin layer (-500 nm) of Faber-Caste1 HB
drawing pencil lead rubbed onto the slightly roughened rod end
surface opposite the optical fiber. Gold electrodes (<50 nm) are
deposited on top of the carbon film except for a 0.25 mm gap
which forms the phonon sensitive element. Electrical conduction in
such a carbon filmis dueprimarily to phonon assisted hopping of
electrons between shallow electron traps. Thus a phonon burst
incident on our sensor produces a decrease in resistance.In order
to sense this change in resistance we bias the device with a 100 nA
dc current and monitor the resultant voltage pulse with a Tektronix
model AM502 preamplifier connectedto a Tektronix model2430
digitizing oscilloscope. As shown in Figure 6, approximately 15
psec after the laser pulse we observe the leading edge of a pulse
with a rise time consistent with the time constant given by the
sensor resistance (10KQ) multiplied by the cable capacitance (400
pF). The recovery time probablyis dominated bythe thermal time
constant of the crystal. Signal averagin was used to improve the
signal to noise ratio by a factor of (256$12 = 16.
Laser Trigger
T=ZmK
J
0
MICROSECONDS
Figure 6. Thermistor response to laser pulses showing delay due
to ballistic phonon transit time.

A Monte Carlo analysis has been applied to this silicon rod
geometry . F,or phonons emitted from a point at one end of the
crystal, the other endof the rod with the sensorstrip is within the
focussingsquaredominated by the T2 phonons(Figure 7a).
Figure 7b shows the distribution of arrival times for the entire
surface of the rod end. Except for an insignificant number of fastL
mode phonons, thedistribution is -1 microsecond long between
15 and 16 microsecondsafter the laser pulse, which agrees well
with our experimental data.
Figure 7. (a) Calculated phonon intensity across rod end showing
active region of thermistor; (b) Calculated arrival time distribution
for end face of rod.
We have determined the energy arriving at the CMN cell
through the optical fiber by comparing the temperaturerise of the
ceil due to a large number of laser pulses (1.5 x lo7) at high
repetition rate (75 kHz) with a similaf temperature increase caused
by Joule heating of thesensor.We find 5 x joule per pulse
(30GeV per pulse). Of this energy reaching thecell, we esumate
that 10% is transmitted into the silicon, or about 3 GeV per pulse.
The Monte C&lo calculation suggests that only about5 x 10-5.0f
that energy actually reaches the sensor strip (about 150 keV). Since
olir goal is to detect 20 eV, this particular carbon film sensor with
this particular preamplifierfalls short by a factorof lo4. However,
it has been very helpful for these timing resolution experiments and
for furthering our understanding of the ballistic phonon processes.
Aluha Particle Detection with Suuerconductinp: Transition Sensor
preliminary particle detection experiments have beendone with
aluminum superconductingtransition edge sensors consistingof
meander patterns made with pm 2 wide by 40 nm thick aluminum
lines deposited directly on a 275 pm thick crystalline silicon
substrate (Figure 8). A typical superconducting transition for one
Figure 8. Seventeen line meander pattern for superconducting
transition edge detector (2 p n lines and3 pm spaces).
47 1
of these patterns is shown in Figure 9. If the device is biased with
a current slightly less than the critical current at the operating
temperature, direct alpha particle bombardment of the aluminum
f i i from a 6 pCi241Am source produces self-terminating voltage
pulses as shown in Figure loa. These pulses occur because the
alpha particles deposit enough energy (-100 keV) in the film to
initiate transitions across thefull width of a line. Figure 10b shows
the spectrum of pulse heights observed. No attempt has been made
to optimize the spectral resolution. This technique for direct particle
detection was oriinallydemonstrated by Spiel,Boom,and
Crittenden in 1965 .B
TEMPERATURE (K)
Figure 9. Superconductingtransition for 400 nm aluminum film
transition edge detector.
s
(D
z
v)
I-
z
3
8 0 500
CHANNEL
1000
Figure 10. (a) Typical pulsecaused by alpha particle incident on
front side of 299 line transition edge detector; (b) Pulse height
spectrum.
The most significant step to date in our program to develop
crystal acoustic detectors has been the detection of alpha particles
incident on the back of the substrate. The rangeof a 5 MeV alpha
pwicle in silicon is only -20 pm. Therefore the detector response
must be due to phonons generatedin the stopping process. To our
knowledge,these resultsare thefirst demonstration of
phorion-mediutedparricle detection. Figure 1l a is a typical pulse
from our 299 line sensor caused by an alpha particle incidenton the
back side of the silicon wafer. The ballistic phonon energy arriving
at the meanderpattern is about 500keV. The resultant pulses are
three to five times smaller than thosefrom alphasincident directly
on the aluminum film. In Figure1l b it is clear that thereis a broad
distribution of pulse heights from alphas hitting
the back side.
We intend to use these transition edge devices in timing and
spatial resolution experiments involving cubes of silicon withedge
lengths of a few centimeters.
412
MICROSECONDS
0 500 1000
CHANNEL
Figure 11. (a) Typical pulse caused by alpha particle incident on
back side of 299 line transition edge detector; (b) Pulse height
spectrum.
Development of Superconductinp Tunnel Junctions
As discussed earlier, superconducting tunnel junctions offer the
greatest sensitivity as phonon sensors. Figure 12 shows a pair of
edge-masked junctions of a type that we are currently testing. The
larger device has an area of 1000 pm x 1000 pm, and the smaller
one has an area of 100 pm x 100 pm. In each case theupper and
lower metal films are made of 40 nm aluminum. The tunneling
bamer is a 2 nm layer of A1203 . The edge mask, which is
designed to reduce the probability of intermetallic contact where the
films cross, is 300 nm af Si02 . Very thin aluminum films were
used in an attempt to raise thesuperconductingtransition
temperature substantially above Tc forbulk aluminum so that a
simple 4He cold plate operating at 1.3 K would be adequate for
preliminary testing. In fact, Tcfor these sensors is only a few
percent above the cold plate temperature,so it has been difficult to
assess the quality of the junctions. We arenow designing a small
cryopumped 3He refrigerator optimized for fast cycling to0.3 Kin
order to do definitive tests of thesedevices and others with thicker 9.
films. Because of their limited areacoverage, these junctions will
beusedprimarilyforthepurpose of evaluatingelectronic
instrumentation rather thanfor SiCAD phonon sensing.
Figure 12, Maskgeometry for initial tests on superconducting
tunnel junctions.
The challenge,of course, is to construct parallel tunnel junction
strips each with area approaching 1 cm2. We are in the processof
constructing such tunnel junctions by using modern integrated
circuitfabricationtechniques and novelgeometry.Weare
confident that exploitationof recently developed integrated circuit
technology will allow these devices to be fabricated reliably.
Acknowledtrments
This work has been funded in part by grants from Research
Corporation and from Lockheed Corporation. We are grateful to
Mike Seiffert for assisting in the carbon thermistor experiment, and
we want tothank Adrian Lee for participating in the transitionedge
detector measurements.
References
1. S.H. Moseley, J.C. Mather and D. McCammon, "Thermal
Detectors as X-Ray Spectrometers", J. Appl. Phys. 56,1257,
1984; also D. McCammon, S.H. Moseley, LC. Mather and
R.F. Mushotzky, "Experimental Tests of a Single-Photon
CalorimeterforX-RaySpectroscopy",J.Appl.Phys. 56,
1263,1984.
2. B. Cabrera, L. Krauss, and F. Wilzcek, "Bolometric Detection
of Neutrinos", Phys. Rev. Lett. 55, 25, 1985.
3. B. Cabrera, C . J. Martoff, and B. Neuhauser, "Acoustic
Detection of Single Particles," submitted to NuclearInstr. and
Methods.
4. See for example: Nonequilibrium PhononDynamics, ed. W.E.
Bron, NATO AS1 Series B124, Plenum Press, N.Y., 1985.
5. D. Twerenbold, "Giaever-Type Superconducting Tunnelling
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Lett. 1, 209, 1986.
6. H. Kraus,Th.Peterreins, F. Probst,F. v. Feilitzsch,
R.L. Mossbauer, and E. Umlauf, "High-Resolution X-Ray
Detection with SuperconductingTunnel Junctions", Europhys.
Lett. 1, 161, 1986.
7. B. Neuhauser, B. Cabrera, C. J. Martoff, B.A. Young, and
M. Seiffert, in preparation.
8. W. Knaak and M. Meissner, ""Time-Resolved Specific Heat
Measurements of High-Purity Single Crystals Between50 mK
and 1 K", LT-17, eds. U. Eckem, A.Schmid, W. Weber, and
H. Wuhl, Elsevier Sci. Pub. B.V., p. 667, 1984.
D.E. Spiel, R. W. Boom,and E.
C. Crittenden, Jr.,
"Thermal Spikes in Superconducting Thin Films of Sn and
In", Appl. Phys. Lett. 7, 292, 1965.