Characterization of the silicon+ $^6$LiF thermal neutron detection technique

Abstract The worldwide need to replace 3 He for neutron detection has triggered research and development on new technologies and methods. A promising one is based on commercial solid state silicon detectors coupled with thin neutron converter layers containing 6 Li. After proving the feasibility of this technique, we characterized the behavior of such a detector with different converter layer thicknesses. In this paper we also disentangle other contributions to the overall spectrum shape observed with this kind of detector, proving that its detection efficiency can be made reasonably high and that the gamma/neutron discrimination capability is comparable to that of 3 He tubes.