Abstract
Radiation hardness is an important property to examine in scintillators to help determine their expected lifetime in application cases where significant radiation dose is expected. Industrial imaging systems using 9 MV linear accelerators for x-ray radiography are one such application where significant radiation doses are expected to the scintillators used. Cadmium tungstate scintillators (CWO) and Thallium doped Cesium Iodide scintillators (CsI(Tl)) are used in some high energy cargo x-ray radiography systems. However, CWO has a high manufacturing cost for adequately uniform crystals and CsI(Tl) does not have sufficient radiation hardness. LKH-5 glass is being investigated as a potential low cost replacement for CWO and CsI(Tl). In this experiment 36 samples of a terbium doped silicate glass called LKH-5 were irradiated at doses up to 5 MRad using a 9 MV linear accelerator, and the change in their transmission properties was observed. The glass was discovered to be a radiation hard glass due to the relatively small change in the transmission of the glass: less than 3% per cm at its emission peak of 550 nm and 5 MRad. This is similar to CWO which has a reported reduction in transmitted light of 2% per cm at 5 MRad and the emission peak of 475 nm and better than CsI(Tl) which is reported to have a reduction in transmitted light of 5% per cm at the emission peak of 550 nm and 4.2 MRad dose. Furthermore, an annealing procedure is described that returned the transmission of the glass to pre-irradiation values.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 164551 |
| Journal | Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research, Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment |
| Volume | 982 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Dec 1 2020 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Funding
This work has been supported by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) , Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction (CWMD) office, under a competitively awarded grant 2016-DN-077-ARI103 . This support does not constitute an express or implied endorsement on the part of the Government. In addition, they would like to thank Collimated Holes for providing the glass samples for irradiation and Varex Imaging for allowing us to house our linear accelerator in their facility for irradiating the samples. The authors would also like to thank the University of Tennessee Scintillator Materials Research Center (SMRC) for the use of their equipment for transmission measurements. This material is based upon work supported by the Department of Energy National Nuclear Security Administration, United States of America through the Nuclear Science and Security Consortium under Award Number DE-NA0003180 . This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government . Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or limited, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof. This work has been supported by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction (CWMD) office, under a competitively awarded grant 2016-DN-077-ARI103. This support does not constitute an express or implied endorsement on the part of the Government. In addition, they would like to thank Collimated Holes for providing the glass samples for irradiation and Varex Imaging for allowing us to house our linear accelerator in their facility for irradiating the samples. The authors would also like to thank the University of Tennessee Scintillator Materials Research Center (SMRC) for the use of their equipment for transmission measurements. This material is based upon work supported by the Department of Energy National Nuclear Security Administration, United States of America through the Nuclear Science and Security Consortium under Award Number DE-NA0003180. This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or limited, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof.
Keywords
- Glass scintillator
- High energy x-ray
- Radiation hardness