Modeling, design, fabrication and experimentation of a GaN-based, 63Ni betavoltaic battery

C Munson (1, 2) , Q. Gaimard (3) , Kamel Merghem (3) , S. Sundaram (1) , J. Rogers (4) , Jacques Sanoit (de) (5) , P Voss (1, 2) , A. Ramdane (3) , Jean-Paul Salvestrini (1, 2) , A. Ougazzaden (1, 2)

1 Georgia Tech Lorraine [Metz]
2 Georgia Institute of Technology [Atlanta]
3 LPN - Laboratoire de photonique et de nanostructures
4 Nanovation - Nanovation SARL
5 LCD-LIST - Laboratoire Capteurs Diamant

GaN is a durable, radiation hard and wide-bandgap semiconductor material, making it ideal for usage with betavoltaic batteries. This paper describes the design, fabrication and experimental testing of 1 cm$^2$ GaN-based betavoltaic batteries (that achieve an output power of 2.23 nW) along with a full model that accurately simulates the device performance which is the highest to date (to the best of our knowledge) for GaN-based devices with a $^{Ni}$63 source.

Keywords: battery; $^{Ni}$63; GaN; betavoltaic

Domains: Engineering Sciences [physics]; Electronics; Engineering Sciences [physics]; Electric power; Computer Science [cs]; Modeling and Simulation

C Munson, Q. Gaimard, Kamel Merghem, S. Sundaram, J. Rogers, et al.. Modeling, design, fabrication and experimentation of a GaN-based, 63Ni betavoltaic battery. Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, 2018, 51 (3), pp.035101. ⟨10.1088/1361-6463/aa9e41⟩. ⟨cea-01765048⟩