A New Solid Solution Approach for the Study of Self-Irradiating Damage in non-Radioactive Materials

A new method to produce a model system for the study of radiation damage in non-radioactive materials is presented. The method is based on homogenously dissolving minute amounts of ²²⁸Th ions in thin films in a controllable manner using a small volume chemical bath deposition technique. This approach is demonstrated for PbS films. The properties of the PbS (²²⁸Th) solid solution film activity were investigated by monitoring the accompanying radioactive processes. Electrical resistivity studies were performed and decay-event damage accumulation was measured, followed by isochronal annealing which presented two annealing stages and another two sub-stages. This is the first report on self-irradiating damage studies in IV-VI semiconductors and the resulting films present a novel method for the analysis of dilute defect systems in semiconductor thin films.