| Title | Structure and scintillation properties of cerium-doped Barium chloride ceramics: Effects of cation and anion substitution |
| Publication Type | Journal Article |
| Year of Publication | 2010 |
| Authors | Edgar, A., Bartle M., Varoy C., Raymond S., and Williams G. |
| Journal | IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science |
| Volume | 57 |
| Issue | 3 PART 2 |
| Pagination | 1218 - 1222 |
| Date Published | 2010 |
| ISSN | 00189499 (ISSN) |
| Keywords | Barium, Barium chloride, Barium compounds, Bromine, Cation dopants, Ceramic, Ceramic materials, Ceramic samples, Cerium, Cerium chloride, Cerium compounds, Cesium, Chloride ions, Chlorine, Chlorine compounds, Cubic phase, Cubic symmetry, Doping (additives), Fluorite structure, Gadolinium, Gamma rays, Holographic interferometry, Interstitial sites, Ionization, Light emission, Light yield, Long afterglow, Phosphors, Photo peaks, Photoluminescence lifetime, Positive ions, Powder X ray diffraction, Scintillation, Scintillation counters, Scintillation decay, Scintillation efficiency, Scintillation properties, Scintillation pulse, Structural effect, Structural stabilization, Sub-lattices, Time constants, X ray diffraction |
| Abstract | Barium chloride has been doped with cerium chloride to form ceramic samples of composition Ba 1-xCe xCl 2+x We find from the powder X-ray diffraction patterns that the compounds adopt the cubic fluorite structure for 0.06 < x < 0.33, not the usual orthorhombic BaCl 2 structure. The cation sublattice in this rare-earth stabilized cubic phase is disordered, whilst the additional chloride ions are accommodated at interstitial sites. Samples with x ∼ 0.125 are translucent, and show a scintillation photopeak for 137Cs gamma rays which can be used to compute a light yield of 7200 photons/MeV. The scintillation decay is characterized by a time constant of 50 ns, compared to a Ce 3+ photoluminescence lifetime of 26 ns. We also report the structural effects of alternative cation dopants, including Gd, Lu, Sm and Y, and find that only Gd results in the same structural stabilization, but when additionally Ce doped the scintillation efficiency is only 2600 ph/MeV with a long afterglow. The effects of bromine substitution for chlorine in Ba 1-xCe xCl 2+x toformBa 1-xCe xCl 2-2xBr 3x results in a material of near-cubic symmetry which is not transparent and does not show a photopeak, but for which the largest scintillation pulses correspond to an efficiency of 14,000 ph/MeV. © 2010 IEEE. |
| URL | http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?eid=2-s2.0-77953957325&partnerID=40&md5=bc1fe4bf92f7a48b71449113aab9eeb0 |
| DOI | 10.1109/TNS.2010.2046181 |
