Some New Results on Irradiation Characteristics of Synthetic Quartz Crystals and Their Application to Radiation Hardening

Harish Bahadur, R. Parshad

Abstract:	The paper reports some new results on irradiation characteristics of synthetic quartz crystals and their application to radiation hardening. The present results show how the frequency shift in quartz crystals can be influenced by heat processing prior to irradiation and how this procedure can lead to radiation hardening for obtaining precise frequencies and time intervals from quartz oscillators in space. In line with the thinking already proposed (H.Bahadur and R. Parshad, Proc. 12th PTTI Conference, pp.829- 849, 1980) for explaining some of the irradiation characteristics of natural crystals, for the present work, it was assumed that the positive frequency shift in irradiated synthetic crystals is due to crystal imperfections. The crystal imperfections in synthetic crystals were sought to be removed by appropriate annealing (slow heating to 240°C followed by sl~w cooling). Different annealed crystals on irradiation gave either a negative frequency shift, thus simulating the behavior of natural crystals or almost a zero frequency shift. This result would be due to the positive frequency contribution of remnant crystal defects matching the negative frequency contribution of the A-centers of the crystal lattice. The experimental results indicate a new way of radiation hardening.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 14th Annual Precise Time and Time Interval Systems and Applications Meeting November 30 - 3, 1982 NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, Maryland
Pages:	593 - 604
Cite this article:	Bahadur, Harish, Parshad, R., "Some New Results on Irradiation Characteristics of Synthetic Quartz Crystals and Their Application to Radiation Hardening," Proceedings of the 14th Annual Precise Time and Time Interval Systems and Applications Meeting, Greenbelt, Maryland, November 1982, pp. 593-604.
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