Investigation of reactor neutron irradiation induced dark signals increase in COTS array CCDs

The experiments of reactor neutron irradiation which induce dark signal increase in COTS array CCDs are presented. The flux of the reactor neutron beams was about 1.33 × 108 n/cm2s. The three samples were exposed to 1MeV neutron-equivalent fluences of 1 × 1011, 5 × 1011, and 1 × 1012 n/cm2, respectively. The mean dark signal (KD), dark signal non-uniformity (DSNU), and dark signal spikes (hot pixels) versus neutron fluence are investigated. The degradation mechanisms of the dark signal in CCDs are analyzed. The mean dark signal increase due to neutron displacement damage appears to be proportional to displacement damage dose. The dark images from the CCDs irradiated by neutrons are presented to investigate the generation of dark signal spike. The 1D and 2D figures which show the output signal voltage of pixels in dark images irradiated by different neutron beam fluences, are presented to compare the degradation of KD, DSNU, and dark signal spike.