ABSTRACT
Semiconductor detectors fabricated from wide band-gap materials have material resistivities high enough to reduce leakage currents to low levels, and, as a result, require rectifying contacts to suppress leakage currents. Semiconductors are much better for energy spectroscopy than are gas-filled or scintillation detectors because semiconductors have vastly superior energy resolution. Semiconductor detectors can be fashioned into many different configurations, including junction diodes, Schottky barrier diodes, photoconductors, and photoresistors. Synthesis and development of semiconductor materials and semiconductor detectors requires characterization of certain properties to better understand expected performance of a detector. Contact resistance is another fundamental property used as a quality metric for semiconductor detectors. The resistance of a blocking contact gives a measure of the rectification quality, while the resistance of an ohmic contact is used as a measure of conductance quality.
