Abstract: Currently, the known method of shortening the scintillation response of scintillation material is to suppress the amplitude-minor slower components of the scintillation response, whereas the possibilities of significant shortening of the amplitude-dominant component of the scintillation response in this method are limited. The invention concerns the method of shortening the scintillation response of scintillator luminescence centres which uses co-doping with Ce or Pr together with co-doping with ions from the lanthanoids, 3d transition metals, 4d transition metals or 5s2 or 6s2 ions group. Having had the luminescence centres electrons excited as a result of absorbed electromagnetic radiation, the scintillator created in this method is capable of taking away a part of the energy from the excited luminescence centres via a non-radiative energy transfer, which results in a significant shortening of the time of duration of the amplitude-dominant component of the scintillation response.

Abstract: A scintillation detection unit for the detection of back-scattered electrons for electron and ion microscopes, in which the scintillation detection unit consists of body and at least one system for processing the light signal, where the body is at least partly made of scintillation material and is at least partly situated in a column of an electron or ion microscope and is made up of at least one hollow part. The height of the body of scintillation detection unit measured in the direction of longitudinal axis is greater than one-and-a-half times the greatest width measured in the direction perpendicular to the longitudinal axis of the hollow part with the greatest width. The walls of the hollow parts are vacuum-sealed in the areas outside bottom holes and top holes and make up part of a vacuum-sealed jacket which is passed through by the primary beam of electrons.