As part of the OPUS24 project, Heterostructures for Ultrafast Scintillation Detectors, Dr. Ivan Yakymenko from the Oxide Crystal Group at Ensemble3 visited the European Centre for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva, Switzerland.

The visit focused on characterizing the scintillation properties of heterostructures developed for Positron Emission Tomography applications. These structures were produced through a collaboration between Ensemble3 and the Centrum NanoBioMedyczne at Adam Mickiewicz University (UAM) in Poznań. The characterization was conducted in CERN’s RD18 Lab, led by Dr. Etiennette Auffray.

One of the key developments in this project is the BGO@ZnO heterostructure scintillator, a promising new type of detector. This structure consists of a layer of heavy scintillator material, such as BGO, which offers high stopping power, combined with a ZnO layer that provides ultrafast scintillation decay. The BGO substrates were fabricated by the Oxide Crystal Group at Ensemble3 headed by Prof. Oleg Sidletskiy, while the ZnO layers were deposited by our colleagues at UAM, under the leadership of Prof. Nataliya Babayevska.

Dr. Ivan Yakymenko conducting scintillation parameter measurements at CERN.

BSO@ZnO heterostructure mounted on a Si photomultiplier.