Study of a gold-foil-based multisphere neutron spectrometer.
Multisphere neutron spectrometers with active thermal neutron detectors cannot be used in high-intensity radiation fields due to pulse pile-up and dead-time effects. Thus, a multisphere spectrometer using a passive detection system, specifically gold foils, has been investigated in this work. The responses of a gold-foil-based Bonner sphere neutron spectrometer were studied for two different gold-foil holder designs; an aluminium-polyethylene holder and a polyethylene holder. The responses of the two designs were calculated for four incident neutron beam directions, namely, parallel, perpendicular and at +/-45 degrees relative to the flat surface of the foil. It was found that the use of polyethylene holder resulted in a more isotropic response to neutrons for the four incident directions considered. The computed responses were verified by measuring the neutron spectrum of a 252Cf source with known strength.
Wang
Z
Z
Neely Nuclear Research Center, G. W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0405, USA. zlwang@mdanderson.org
Hutchinson
J D
JD
Hertel
N E
NE
Burgett
E
E
Howell
R M
RM
D002138:Calibration; D004867:Equipment Design; D006046:Gold; D009502:Neutrons; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012542:Scattering, Radiation; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D013057:Spectrum Analysis / Q000295:instrumentation*
D006046:Gold