Amorphous silicon-based microchannel plate detectors with high multiplication gain

With their fast response time and a spatial resolution in the range of a few microns, microchannel plates (MCPs) are a prominent choice for the development of detectors with highest resolution standards. Amorphous silicon-based microchannel plates (AMCPs) aim at overcoming the fabrication drawbacks of conventional MCPs and the long dead time of their individual channels. AMCPs are fabricated via plasma deposition and dry reactive ion etching. Using a state-of-the-art dry reactive ion etching process, the aspect ratio, so far limited to a value of 14, could be considerably enhanced with a potential for very high gain values. We show first fabricated AMCP devices and provide an outlook for gain values to be expected based on the fabrication results.Comment: Preprin

Performance and Transient Behavior of Vertically Integrated Thin-film Silicon Sensors

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Microcrystalline p–i–n cells: a drift-controlled device?

The objective of this paper is to get more insight into the physics of microcrystalline silicon based solar cell by studying electric field profiles, spectral responses and current–voltage characteristics. Based on a comparison with a-Si:H p–i–n and c-Si p–n diodes, we concluded that μc-Si:H p–i–n devices are not field-controlled despite the presence of a high electric field in the i-layer

Review of amorphous silicon based particle detectors: the quest for single particle detection

Hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) is attractive for radiation detectors because of its radiation resistance and processability over large areas with mature Si microfabrication techniques. While the use of a-Si:H for medical imaging has been very successful, the development of detectors for particle tracking and minimum-ionizing-particle detection has lagged, with almost no practical implementation. This paper reviews the development of various types of a-Si:H-based detectors and discusses their respective achievements and limitations. It also presents more recent developments of detectors that could potentially achieve single particle detection and be integrated in a monolithic fashion into a variety of applications

Control algorithm for a residential photovoltaic system with storage

High penetration of photovoltaic (PV) electricity could affect the stability of the low-voltage grid due to over-voltage and transformer overloading at times of peak production. Residential battery storage can smooth out those peaks and hence contribute to grid stability. A feed-in limit allows for the easy setting of a maximum power injection cap and motivates PV owners to increase their self-consumption. A simple control strategy for a residential battery system coupled with a PV system that maximizes selfconsumption and minimizes curtailment losses due to a feed-in limit is presented. The algorithm used in this strategy does not require a forecast of insulation conditions. The performance of this algorithm is compared to a second algorithm—a control strategy based on linear optimization using a forecast. Assuming an exact forecast, this second algorithm is very close to the maximum self-consumption and minimum curtailment losses achievable and can be used to benchmark the simple strategy. The results show that the simple strategy performs as well as the second algorithm with exact forecasts and performs significantly better than the second algorithm using real forecasts. Moreover, it is shown that this result is valid for a large range of storage capacities and PV sizes. Furthermore, it is shown that with a time resolution of 15 min for the input data (the resolution of most PV production and load data) selfconsumption is overestimated by about 3% and curtailment losses are underestimated by the same amount. Load sensitivity simulations show that different load curve shapes do not fundamentally change the results. Finally, to assess the effect of load aggregation, the case where the strategy is applied separately to 44 households with storage is compared to the case where it is applied to a centralized storage system of the same size as the total storage of the 44 households. The reduction of the curtailment losses with the number of aggregated houses is showed

Effect of the Fluctuations of PV Production and Electricity Demand on the PV Electricity Self-Consumption

The electricity self-consumption level of a family household is determined both experimentally and by modelling. The effect of rapid fluctuation in PV production and electricity demand, and especially the effect of the temporal resolution of their measurements, are studied. For accurate determination of the self-consumption level, temporal resolution of at least 30 s for the load profile and at least 10 min for the PV production measurements are suggested. The effect of temporal resolution becomes negligible when a local electricity storage system is added. Keywords: Small Grid-connected PV Systems, storage, gird integratio