Novel Scintillation Material - ZnO Transparent Ceramics

ZnO-based scintillation ceramics for application in HENPA LENPA analyzers have been investigated. The following ceramic samples have been prepared: undoped ones (ZnO), an excess of zinc in stoichiometry (ZnO:Zn), doped with gallium (ZnO:Ga) and lithium (ZnO:Li). Optical transmission, x-ray excited emission, scintillation decay and pulse height spectra were measured and analyzed. Ceramics have reasonable transparency in visible range (up to 60% for 0.4 mm thickness) and energy resolution (14.9% at 662 keV Cs137 gamma excitation). Undoped ZnO shows slow (1.6 {\mu}s) luminescence with maximum at 2.37 eV and light yield about 57% of CsI:Tl. ZnO:Ga ceramics show relatively low light yield with ultra fast decay time (1 ns). Lithium doped ceramics ZnO:Li have better decay time than undoped ZnO with fair light yield. ZnO:Li ceramics show good characteristics under alpha-particle excitation and can be applied for the neutral particle analyzers.Comment: 4 pages, 8 figures, research covered in this paper was presented at SCINT2011 conference as a poster, submitted for publication at IEEE Trans. Nucl. Sc

Location of the Energy Levels of the Rare-Earth Ion in BaF2 and CdF2

The location of the energy levels of rare-earth (RE) elements in the energy band diagram of BaF2 and CdF2 crystals is determined. The role of RE3+ and RE2+ ions in the capture of charge carriers, luminescence, and the formation of radiation defects is evaluated. It is shown that the substantial difference in the luminescence properties of BaF2:RE and CdF2:RE is associated with the location of the excited energy levels in the band diagram of the crystals

Trends and patterns of scintillator nonproportionality

Data on the photon nonproportional response of 33 inorganic scintillation materials are systemized and analyzed. The main trends of nonproportionality for different groups of inorganic scintillators, especially for oxides and halides, are highlighted. The dependence of the shape and degree of photon nonproportional response versus chemical composition, dopant type, refractive index and other fundamental properties of the materials is studied. Better proportionality appears to be correlated with higher refractive index of the compound. Another related factor is the width of the valence band in halide compounds. With larger valence band width from fluorides, to chlorides, to bromides, and to iodides, a better proportionality is observed.Comment: 13 pages, 18 figures, 2 tables. Submitted to IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Scienc

Nonproportional response of LaBr3LaBr_{3}:Ce and LaCl3LaCl_{3}:Ce scintillators to synchrotron x-ray irradiation

The nonproportional scintillation response of LaBr(3) doped with 5% Ce(3+) and of LaCl(3) doped with 10% Ce(3+) was measured using highly monochromatic synchrotron irradiation. To estimate the photon response, pulse height spectra at many finely spaced energy values between 9 and 100 keV were measured. The experiment was carried out at the X-1 beamline at the Hamburger Synhrotronstrahlungslabor (HASYLAB) synchrotron radiation facility in Hamburg, Germany. Special attention was paid to the x-ray fluorescence escape peaks as they provide us with additional information about photon response in the range 1.2-14.5 keV for LaBr(3):Ce and 2.0-11.6 keV for LaCl(3):Ce. A rapid variation of the photon response curve is observed near the lanthanum K-electron binding energy for both scintillators. A dense sampling of data was performed around this energy and those data are used to apply a method, which we call K-dip spectroscopy. This method allows us to derive the electron response curves of LaBr(3):Ce and LaCl(3):Ce down to energies as low as 0.1 keV