Typehyphen;IIb diamonds are partially compensatedphyphen;type semiconductors at room temperature. Radiation damage makes such diamonds highly insulating. This effect can be exploited to make a fast radiation detector which is sensitive both to light and charged particles. This is done by confining the radiation damage to a narrow band within the crystal. The decay time is less than 3times;10minus;10s after illumination with photons of energy 3.68 eV (337 nm). The fact that rsquo;rsquo;counting diamondsrsquo;rsquo; can now be manufactured from the relatively abundant typehyphen;IIb diamonds, both natural and synthetic, will be of some interest, since natural counting diamonds are very rare.
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