[time-nuts] Gamma-ray and jitter

[Florian E. Teply]

On Sun, 14 Nov 2010 01:27:10 +0100
Magnus Danielson <magnus at rubidium.dyndns.org> wrote:
> 
> Don't recall from the top of my head the effects of gamma-rays on 
> crystals, but I do recall there is effects there. However, I do
> suspect they are rather poor gamma-ray detectors and loads of other
> sources to hide any correlation from direct observation.
> 
IIRC, Crystals usually are made up from silicon dioxide in a more or
less pure crystalline form. I usually deal with more or less amorphuous
silicon dioxide as in gate oxides, and i'm not sure whether or not this
makes a difference.
Anyways, gamma rays can produce electron-hole pairs in SiO2. And while
electrons are fairly mobile (at least compared to the holes), this can
depending on DC bias conditions lead to a net positive charge inside
the crystal. This charge could be annealed though by applying high
temperatures on the order of several hundred °C to the crystal.
No idea what some electric field could do jitter-wise though. Might
have to do with some sort of mechanical stress inside the crystal due 
to electric forces.

I think there are more mechanisms, but here i'm not sure. Am just
learning about that stuff. But I would be willing to look it up at
work ;-)

HTH,
Florian