ADVENT DIAMOND, INC. — Department of Energy SBIR Phase II: C47-13a

Description

Synchrotron beamlines facilities provide critical access to x-ray sources for scientific research across fields from biology to materials science. Users at these facilities often have custom requirements that necessitate careful beam adjustments. However, conventional beam monitoring technology is time consuming, wasting the valuable scientific resource of beamtime and reducing the experiments that can be accommodated. The operational cost of these beamlines can be $500-1000/hour, so reducing set-up time even by 30 minutes/day represents a value of up to $125k/year per beamline (250 days). In addition to inefficiencies, the lack of instruments to monitor the beam during experiments leads to scientific pain points, such as a lack of understanding of how the state of the beam impacts the data output. Advent Diamond will solve these problems by bringing to the market a transparent x-ray imaging monitor that includes diamond-based sensors with easy-to-use, compact, and powerful plug-and-play electronics. Customers will be able to choose between a number of custom options, such as standard or diode-structured detectors to meet their needs. Advent Diamond has a patent on the use of doped diamond-based diode structures for this and other radiation detector applications. Already completed in Phase I and II is the design, fabrication and testing of a near-mature prototype beam imaging system. Specifically, the important outcomes from Phase I and II research are: successful fabrication of diode-type and standard diamond sensors with effective pixel size of 50 µm with >90% transparency at 10keV; production of a complete, easy-to-use prototype with plug-and-play setup; testing of prototype system at the NSLS II using x-ray beams 4-ID and 17-BM, demonstrating ability to do real-time, transparent beam imaging at 10 Hz; demonstration of imaging across a wide dynamic range of beam intensities; the development of design concepts to expand commercial opportunities in Phase IIB; and, the development of significant leads for sales, distribution and follow-on funding. In Phase IIB, Advent Diamond proposes to build upon successful Phase II work to enhance the opportunity for commercialization. This will enable the commercialization of two models of synchrotron beam monitors: the Imaging Diamond Monitor on a Card (IDM-C) and the Imaging Diamond Monitor on a Board (IDM-B) with customization options of diode-structured or standard diamond, and 48x48 pixels (2.5mmx2.5mm) or 96x96 pixels (5mmx5mm). Specifically, Phase IIB R&D will include design modifications of the Phase II IDM-B model to move the sensor card into a vacuum-compatible enclosure to offer the IDM-C model and prepare both models for commercialization through performing extensive beta testing, designing enclosure modifications, undergoing design reviews, and preparing for manufacturing. The primary market for this innovation, end stations at synchrotron beamlines, is a low volume market with a premium placed on performance and ability to incorporate instrumentation with minimal design changes to the end-station layout. Compact x-ray sources are expected to become much more common in the coming years, as they are currently being matured in academic research, and will represent a large source of potential sales. Additional applications include incorporating the innovation as a subsystem into end-station detectors to provide real-time corrections to data, and applications in the radiological oncology field. Given that more than half of patients with cancer are treated with radiation therapy, this application has the potential to have a large impact both economically and for human health. Finally, this project represents, to our knowledge, the first commercial product which uses doped diamond as an electronic component, which furthers the goal of supporting domestic next-generation semiconductor capabilities. Given that semiconductors touch nearly every aspect of the world economy, the development of semiconducting diamond has the potential for enormous impact.