🚀 go-pugleaf

I'd appreciate some help in tracking down information about growing aluminum
antimonide (try saying that fast three times! :-) ) crystals.  AlSb has some
interesting properties (at least in theory) from a semiconducting point of view
that make it appealing as possible raw material for gamma-ray spectrometry,
which is what I do for a living.  A friend is trying to squeeze some money out
of the feds for research on the stuff, and I'd like to help him out.

As far as we know, about the most recent attempt at growing high-purity AlSb
was at Livermore about 10 years ago.  That project died prematurely, for more
or less political reasons.  It's a *hard* problem; the tendency of both 
elements to oxidize and the inconveniently low melting point of antimony
combine to cause purity problems.  The friend works at LLNL and has access to
the work that was done there, but if there is anything going on in the private
sector that's newer (and not in the literature), it might be nice to know about
it.  Any help appreciated ...  Please reply by e-mail to avoid cluttering up
the net.

-- 
Bill Johnson				| "This is a bit complicated, so let
Los Alamos National Laboratory		| me explain it backwards."  (first
Los Alamos, New Mexico USA		| line of a memo from a fellow Los
!cmcl2!lanl!mwj (mwj@lanl.gov)		| Alamos physicist who will go unnamed)