Radiation sensor research and development in New Zealand

Medical imaging and radiation and particle detector research and development in New Zealand are being strongly driven by the country´s association with High Energy Physics. New Zealand is part of the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) project at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. Current projects with the CMS group include two aspects of beam radiation monitoring for the CMS detector: the Beam Scintillator (BSC), using plastic scintillator material; and the Beam Condition Monitor (BCM), in which diamond sensors will be employed close to the beam line. Also, the use of semiconductor pixel vertex detectors in previous High Energy Physics experiments has spurred New Zealand to become involved with the MEDIPIX programme at CERN. The first medical images using MEDIPIX2 technology were made at Christchurch Hospital. It is hoped that such applications to medical imaging and in High Energy Physics projects will invigorate research and education in radiation detectors and instrumentation in New Zealand.