Positrons in Material Sciences: Intense Beams for Defect Characterizations and Porosimetry

The Helmholtz-Center Dresden - Rossendorf operates a superconducting electron linear accelerator as a driver for secondary radiation sources, which include two IR-FEL, a broadband high-field THz radiation source, high-energy X-rays, neutrons and positrons. The accelerator runs in continuous-wave (CW) mode and in a 24/7 regime serving an international user community.
Electron-bremsstrahlung is being converted into an intense beam of positrons by means of pair production. After moderation to thermal energies, positrons are re-accelerated to form a mono-energetic positron beam with variable kinetic energies ranging from 0.5 to 18 keV for depth profiling of atomic defects and porosities on nm-scales in thin films. High timing resolutions ( < 100 ps) at high average rates (105 s-1) and adjustable beam repetition rates allow performing high-throughput experiments of positron annihilation lifetimes.
The accelerator-based positron source is complemented by a several radioisotope-driven setups for conventional annihilation lifetime measurements (defect characterizations) and Doppler-broadening spectroscopy, which is sensitive to the defect’s chemical surroundings.
In my presentation, I will highlight some of the unique features of the experimental facilities and I will show various experimental results obtained with positrons in defect characterizations of materials and porosimetry due to their sensitivity on open-volume defects ranging from sub-nm to µm scales.