Advantages and limitations of cadmium selenide room temperature gamma ray detectors

State-of-the-art technology of spectrometer grade CdSe gamma ray detectors is presented in this paper. It is shown that high resistivity CdSe single crystals can be reproducibly grown by the temperature gradient solution zoning technique. Zone refining of Se used for crystal growth is found to reduce efficiently the concentration of Cu trace impurities, which are mainly responsible for the electron trapping. The charge carrier transport parameters are studied in detail, and the perspective of further improvement of the energy resolution of CdSe detectors are discussed. A comparison with the performance of CdTe and HgI₂ nuclear radiation detectors is also given.