Photon and neutron shielding characteristics of samarium doped lead alumino borate glasses containing barium, lithium and zinc oxides determined at medical diagnostic energies

Abstract

In the present work, we studied the radiation shielding parameters such as mass attenuation coefficients, effective atomic number, half value layer, mean free path, macroscopic effective removal cross-sections and neutron transmission function for samarium doped lead alumino borate glasses containing barium, lithium and zinc oxides at medical diagnostic energies (between 20 and 150 keV) using MCNPX code. The results showed that the photon attenuation depends on the type of modifier used (i.e. ZnO, BaO or Li 2 O) and also, upon the energy of the photon. The higher mass attenuation coefficients were found for the glass containing BaO. The results also revealed that the glass containing Li 2 O has the maximum effective atomic number between 20 and 40 keV. In addition, some important neutron shielding parameters such as macroscopic effective removal cross-sections (Σ R ) and neutron transmission function (N/N 0 ) have been calculated for investigated glass samples.