The carrier yield in a-Se under electron bombardment

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Abstract
The authors describe measurements of the field and dose dependence of the carrier yield produced in a-Se by electron beam excitation, using a flight-time technique. The results show that the yield is controlled by stronger initial recombination than that predicted by the Onsager mechanism which governs the photoelectric yield. This strong process is attributed to bimolecular recombination along the tracks of the primary electrons (columnar recombination). On this interpretation, the effective average pair-production energy is approximately 18 eV. The authors speculate on the origin of this high value.