A novel measurement method for SiPM external crosstalk probability at low temperature

• Main Authors: Li, Guanda, Wang, Lei, Sun, Xilei, Liu, Fang, Guo, Cong, Zhao, Kangkang, Tian, Lei, Yu, Zeyuan, Hou, Zhilong, Li, Chi, Lei, Yu, Wang, Bin, Zhou, Rongbin
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 04-06-2024
• Subjects: Physics - Instrumentation and Detectors; Physics - Nuclear Experiment
• DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2406.02249

Silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) are being considered as potential
replacements for conventional photomultiplier tubes (PMTs). However, a
significant disadvantage of SiPMs is crosstalk (CT), wherein photons propagate
through other pixels, resulting in secondary avalanches. CT can be categorized
into internal crosstalk and external crosstalk based on whether the secondary
avalanche occurs within the same SiPM or a different one. Numerous methods
exist for quantitatively estimating the percentage of internal crosstalk (iCT).
However, external crosstalk (eCT) has not been extensively studied.
This article presents a novel measurement method for the probability of
emitting an external crosstalk photon during a single pixel avalanche, using a
setup involving two identical SiPMs facing each other, and without the need for
complex optical designs. The entire apparatus is enclosed within a stainless
steel chamber, functioning as a light-tight enclosure, and maintained at liquid
nitrogen temperature. The experimental setup incorporates two Sensl J-60035
SiPM chips along with two 0.5-inch Hamamatsu Photonics (HPK) VUV4 S13370-6050CN
SiPM arrays. The findings show a linear relationship between the probability of
emitting an external crosstalk photon and the SiPM overvoltage for both SiPM
samples. Surprisingly, this novel measurement method also rovides measurements
of the SiPM photon detection efficiency (PDE) for eCT photons at low
temperature.