Electronics system for the GammaTracker handheld CdZnTe detector

We are currently developing a handheld radioisotope identifier containing eighteen position-sensitive CdZnTe crystals. In addition to isotope identification, the device performs basic Compton imaging to determine the location of suspected sources. This paper gives an overview of the electronics system we have designed for this instrument. We use specialized application-specific integrated circuits to preprocess the outputs of each CdZnTe crystal. A low-power microprocessor running Windows CE drives the user interface and implements the isotope identification and directionality computations. Finally, we use a field-programmable gate array to perform the computationally intensive imaging tasks in real time.