Abstract

The accurate detection and identification of ionizing radiation and radioisotopes is of significant interest to governments, industry and the scientific community, particularly for use in detecting illicit radioactive weapons, among other uses. Of all the methods to detect radiation, scintillation has been a mainstay among handheld or portable detectors owing primarily to its simple equipment requirements. In particular, inorganic crystals and plastic scintillators are two scintillating materials with promising characteristics for use in particle identification. In this work, two promising materials are compared to more common detectors of the same type. The inorganic scintillator SrI2:Eu3% is compared to 2 other inorganic crystals, NaI:Tl and LaBr3:Ce on the basis of its energy resolution. The energy resolution for several gamma-ray energies were measured and SrI2:Eu3% was found to have an energy resolution of (6.7±0.1)% for the 662 keV photopeak. SrI2:Eu3% shows significant promise for use in handheld radiation detectors due to its better energy resolution than NaI:Tl and simpler background than LaBr3:Ce. Also investigated was plastic scintillator EJ-299-33A on the basis of its n/gamma discrimination capabilities. Two sizes of EJ-299-33A, 2” × 1” and 2” × 2” were compared to NE-213 through several different pulse shape discrimination methods. Both sizes of EJ-299-33A were found to have very similar discrimination capability, and were comparable to NE-213. The best discrimination for all detectors was by comparing the PID vs. the pulse height. EJ-299-33A was found to have a figure of merit of 1.03 at energies of about 250 keVee for both sizes. EJ-299-33A shows promise for use in n/gamma discrimination where liquid scintillators are not practical.

Library of Congress Subject Headings

Scintillation counters; Radiation--Measurement

Publication Date

8-2020

Document Type

Thesis

Student Type

Graduate

Degree Name

Materials Science and Engineering (MS)

Department, Program, or Center

School of Chemistry and Materials Science (COS)

Advisor

Sheth Nyibule

Advisor/Committee Member

Udo Schroeder

Advisor/Committee Member

Laura Tubbs

Campus

RIT – Main Campus

Plan Codes

MSENG-MS

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