大尺寸Ce：Lu1.6Y0.4SiO5闪烁晶体的生长和光谱特性

采用中频感应提拉法生长出尺寸为Ф60mm×110mm的Ce：Lu1.6Y0.4SiO5（LYSO）晶体,与LSO晶体相比,LYSO晶体的优势是提高了晶体质量、降低了熔点和原料成本等.在室温下测试了LYSO晶体的透过光谱、激发光谱和发射光谱,结果表明Y的加入使LSO晶体的吸收边向短波方向偏移.Ce^3＋的4f^1→5d^1跃迁吸收导致紫外区产生三个吸收带.发射光谱具有Ce^3＋典型的双峰特征,经Gaussian多峰值拟合,双峰395nm和418nm归属于Ce1发光中心,而435nm的发光峰与Ce2发光中心有

Comparison of cerium-doped Lu2Si2O7 and Lu2SiO5 scintillators

In this paper, high optical quality cerium-doped lutetium pyrosilicate(LPS:Ce) crystal has been grown by Czochralski method with the seed oriented along cleavage plane (1 1 0). The structure, segregation coefficient of Ce3+ and optical characterization of LPS:Ce crystal have been compared with those of LSO:Ce crystal. The results show that LPS:Ce has the advantage over LSO:Ce by having a larger segregation coefficient of Ce3+, lower cost of starting material, lower melting point and only one luminescence mechanism. Thus, LPS:Ce crystal offers an attractive alternative to LSO:Ce for scintillator applications. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Color centers and charge state change in Ce : YAG crystals grown by temperature gradient techniques

Color centers and impurity defects of Ce:YAG crystals grown in reduction atmosphere by temperature gradient techniques have been investigated by means of gamma irradiation and thermal treatments. Four absorption bands associated with color centers or impurity defects at 235, 255, 294 and 370 nm were observed in as-grown crystals. Changes in optical intensity of the 235 and 370 nm bands after gamma irradiation indicate that they are associated with F+-type color center. Charge state change processes of Fe3+ impurity and Ce3+ ions take place in the irradiation process. The variations of Ce3+ ions concentration clearly indicate that Ce4+ ions exist in Ce:YAG crystals and gamma irradiations could increase the concentration of Ce3+ ions. Annealing treatments and the changes in optical density suggest that a heterovalent impurity ion associated with the 294 nm band seems to be present in the crystals. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

掺铈硅酸钆闪烁晶体的研究进展与发展方向

本文综述了铈离子掺质硅酸钆(Ce：Gd2SiO5)闪烁晶体的结构、闪烁性能、闪烁机理及晶体生长的研究现状，重点讨论了Ce：GsO闪烁晶体生长的研究进展；提出了硅酸钆闪烁晶体未来研究发展的几个方向为：大尺寸晶体的生长、高光输出的研究、混合型硅酸钆晶体的研究等。

红外飞秒激光诱导Ce^3＋掺杂闪烁晶体的上转换发光研究

本文研究了红外飞秒激光照射下Ce^3＋ 掺杂的YAP和LSO两种闪烁晶体的上转换发光现象.实验发现在飞秒激光泵浦下,这两种晶体的荧光均来自于Ce^3＋离子的5d-4f跃迁.荧光强度与泵浦光功率之间的依赖关系揭示了Ce^3＋：YAP和Ce^3＋：LSO晶体的上转换过程皆由三光子吸收过程所主导.分析表明,Ce^3＋：YAP和Ce^3＋：LSO晶体中的三光子吸收是三光子同时吸收.

国产YAP：Ce闪烁晶体的相对探测能力测量

为适应在n、γ昆合脉冲辐射场中对低强度快脉冲y辐射测量的需要，近年国内新研制出实用型YAlO3：Ce（YAP：Ce）快响应无机闪烁晶体。我们使用脉冲线性电流大于1．5A的光电倍增管，分别配置这种晶体以及CeF3、NaI等晶体构成闪烁探测器，在放射性标准源场中，对晶体的相对探测能力进行测量。测量结果表明：国产新型YAP：Ce无机晶体对这1．25MeV射线的探测能力比同体积的CeF3平均高一个量级，是同体积NaI的40％左右；当晶体厚度小于2mm时，YAP：Ce与CeF2、NaI的输出比值分别大于16和44％，说明厚度越薄晶体的相对探测能力越强。

Studies of timing for a TOF counter at external target facility

Timing and amplitude properties of a prototype scintillator TOF counter at an external target facility are studied with a cosmic rays test. The dependence of signal pulse height and time resolution on the coordinate along the scintillator TOF counter is investigated with two different discriminators. A time resolution of 165 ps can be achieved at the center of the counter with a constant fraction discriminator. Time resolution better than 150 ps is obtained at the center with a leading edge discriminator af...

Experimental study of the beta-delayed neutron decay of N-21

The first spectroscopic study for the beta decay of N-21 is carried out based on beta-n, beta-gamma, and beta-n-gamma coincidence measurements. The neutron-rich N-21 nuclei are produced by the fragmentation of the E/A=68.8 MeV Mg-26 primary beam on a thick Be-9 target and are implanted into a thin plastic scintillator that also plays the role of beta detector. The time of flight of the emitted neutrons following the beta decay are measured by the surrounding neutron sphere and neutron wall arrays. In addition, four clover germanium detectors are used to detect the beta-delayed gamma rays. Thirteen new beta-delayed neutron groups are observed with a total branching ratio of 90.5 +/- 4.2%. The half-life for the beta decay of N-21 is determined to be 82.9 +/- 7.5 ms. The level scheme of O-21 is deduced up to about 9 MeV excitation energy. The experimental results for the beta decay of N-21 are compared to the shell-model calculations.

Study of the LED based light calibration system for neutron wall detector

The light calibration system is one of the key components of Neutron Wall detector. It is used to calibrate the electronics and to monitor the long-term stability of the detector modules. With the detaile investigations, a calibration system with high-power LED (3W) driven by the fast pulses has been carried out. It is also tested together with the detector module of the Neutron Wall and the result of the preliminary calibration demonstrates that it fulfills the needs. It's a new design proposal to the light calibration system of the fast scintillator detector.

A TOF-PET prototype with position sensitive PMT readout

A prototype of time-of-flight positron emission computed tomography (TOF-PET) has been developed for acquiring the coincident detection of 511 keV gamma-rays produced from positron annihilation. It consists of two 80.5 mmx80.5 mm LYSO scintillator arrays (composed of 35 x35 pixel finger crystals) with the position sensitive photomultiplier tubes R2487 as the readout. Each array is composed of 2 mm x2 mm x 15 mm finger crystals and the average pixel pitch is 2.30 mm. The measured results indicate that the TOF information has the potential to significantly enhance the image quality by improving the noise variance in the image reconstruction. The best spatial resolution (FWHM) of the prototype for the pairs of 511 keV gamma-rays is 1.98 mm and 2.16 mm in the x and y directions, respectively, which are smaller than the average pixel pitch of 2.30 mm.

CSRm外靶实验装置中快塑料闪烁体阵列型探测器研制

随着HIRFL-CSR工程的顺利完工，更高能量和更多种类的束流可以用于实验，大大拓展了可开展的核物理实验研究的内容。为了更好的利用束流，促进核物理实验研究的深入，设计和建造新的大规模探测设备成为必然。本论文工作针对CSR主环外靶实验终端建设，完成了利用飞行时间方法探测中子和带电粒子的两种快塑料闪烁体探测器阵列的研制。其中中子探测器有效体积为1.5  1.5  1 m3，包含252个，两种不同结构的探测单元；每组带电粒子探测器（TOFW）由60个探测单元构成，有效探测面积为1.21.2m2。论文工作通过解决材料加工、抛光、粘接、单元包装、测试等一系列工艺难题，完成了中子探测器和三组TOFW探测器的安装和测试。利用宇宙射线测试得到两种类型中子探测单元和TOFW探测单元的平均时间分辨分别为278 ± 59、272 ± 44和258 ± 51 ps，扣除各种因素后，探测单元的本证时间分辨可以达到80、100和150 ps；对后者利用12C重离子束流在线测试，得到本证时间分辨好于70 ps,完全满足设计的要求。论文工作中还设计完成了探测单元中光电倍增管高压系统的控制和监测系统，并建立了以LED为光源的光刻度系统，用于探测单元的刻度和工作状态的在线监测。在终端现场对探测器进行的初步在束测试表明，两种探测器工作稳定，运行良好，其性能均满足实验需求

Optical spectroscopy properties and charge compensation of BaLiF3 doped with Ce3+

The excitation and emission spectra of the BaLiF3:Ce3+ phosphors synthesized through solid state reaction have been measured. By investigating the properties of the excitation spectra we point out that the variation in the excitation spectra with the amount of CeF3 dopant results from the different patterns of charge compensation in the matrices. The vacancies of Li+ ions are the favorable charge compensation pattern at low concentration of CeF3 doped, but interstitial F- ions are the major charge compensation pattern when the concentration of CeF3 doped goes beyond a certain value. (C) 2000 Academic Press

Monte Carlo Analysis and Physics Characterization of a Novel Nanoparticle Detector for Medical and Micro-dosimetry Applications

The outcomes for both (i) radiation therapy and (ii) preclinical small animal radio- biology studies are dependent on the delivery of a known quantity of radiation to a specific and intentional location. Adverse effects can result from these procedures if the dose to the target is too high or low, and can also result from an incorrect spatial distribution in which nearby normal healthy tissue can be undesirably damaged by poor radiation delivery techniques. Thus, in mice and humans alike, the spatial dose distributions from radiation sources should be well characterized in terms of the absolute dose quantity, and with pin-point accuracy. When dealing with the steep spatial dose gradients consequential to either (i) high dose rate (HDR) brachytherapy or (ii) within the small organs and tissue inhomogeneities of mice, obtaining accurate and highly precise dose results can be very challenging, considering commercially available radiation detection tools, such as ion chambers, are often too large for in-vivo use.

In this dissertation two tools are developed and applied for both clinical and preclinical radiation measurement. The first tool is a novel radiation detector for acquiring physical measurements, fabricated from an inorganic nano-crystalline scintillator that has been fixed on an optical fiber terminus. This dosimeter allows for the measurement of point doses to sub-millimeter resolution, and has the ability to be placed in-vivo in humans and small animals. Real-time data is displayed to the user to provide instant quality assurance and dose-rate information. The second tool utilizes an open source Monte Carlo particle transport code, and was applied for small animal dosimetry studies to calculate organ doses and recommend new techniques of dose prescription in mice, as well as to characterize dose to the murine bone marrow compartment with micron-scale resolution.

Hardware design changes were implemented to reduce the overall fiber diameter to <0.9 mm for the nano-crystalline scintillator based fiber optic detector (NanoFOD) system. Lower limits of device sensitivity were found to be approximately 0.05 cGy/s. Herein, this detector was demonstrated to perform quality assurance of clinical 192Ir HDR brachytherapy procedures, providing comparable dose measurements as thermo-luminescent dosimeters and accuracy within 20% of the treatment planning software (TPS) for 27 treatments conducted, with an inter-quartile range ratio to the TPS dose value of (1.02-0.94=0.08). After removing contaminant signals (Cerenkov and diode background), calibration of the detector enabled accurate dose measurements for vaginal applicator brachytherapy procedures. For 192Ir use, energy response changed by a factor of 2.25 over the SDD values of 3 to 9 cm; however a cap made of 0.2 mm thickness silver reduced energy dependence to a factor of 1.25 over the same SDD range, but had the consequence of reducing overall sensitivity by 33%.

For preclinical measurements, dose accuracy of the NanoFOD was within 1.3% of MOSFET measured dose values in a cylindrical mouse phantom at 225 kV for x-ray irradiation at angles of 0, 90, 180, and 270˝. The NanoFOD exhibited small changes in angular sensitivity, with a coefficient of variation (COV) of 3.6% at 120 kV and 1% at 225 kV. When the NanoFOD was placed alongside a MOSFET in the liver of a sacrificed mouse and treatment was delivered at 225 kV with 0.3 mm Cu filter, the dose difference was only 1.09% with use of the 4x4 cm collimator, and -0.03% with no collimation. Additionally, the NanoFOD utilized a scintillator of 11 µm thickness to measure small x-ray fields for microbeam radiation therapy (MRT) applications, and achieved 2.7% dose accuracy of the microbeam peak in comparison to radiochromic film. Modest differences between the full-width at half maximum measured lateral dimension of the MRT system were observed between the NanoFOD (420 µm) and radiochromic film (320 µm), but these differences have been explained mostly as an artifact due to the geometry used and volumetric effects in the scintillator material. Characterization of the energy dependence for the yttrium-oxide based scintillator material was performed in the range of 40-320 kV (2 mm Al filtration), and the maximum device sensitivity was achieved at 100 kV. Tissue maximum ratio data measurements were carried out on a small animal x-ray irradiator system at 320 kV and demonstrated an average difference of 0.9% as compared to a MOSFET dosimeter in the range of 2.5 to 33 cm depth in tissue equivalent plastic blocks. Irradiation of the NanoFOD fiber and scintillator material on a 137Cs gamma irradiator to 1600 Gy did not produce any measurable change in light output, suggesting that the NanoFOD system may be re-used without the need for replacement or recalibration over its lifetime.

For small animal irradiator systems, researchers can deliver a given dose to a target organ by controlling exposure time. Currently, researchers calculate this exposure time by dividing the total dose that they wish to deliver by a single provided dose rate value. This method is independent of the target organ. Studies conducted here used Monte Carlo particle transport codes to justify a new method of dose prescription in mice, that considers organ specific doses. Monte Carlo simulations were performed in the Geant4 Application for Tomographic Emission (GATE) toolkit using a MOBY mouse whole-body phantom. The non-homogeneous phantom was comprised of 256x256x800 voxels of size 0.145x0.145x0.145 mm3. Differences of up to 20-30% in dose to soft-tissue target organs was demonstrated, and methods for alleviating these errors were suggested during whole body radiation of mice by utilizing organ specific and x-ray tube filter specific dose rates for all irradiations.

Monte Carlo analysis was used on 1 µm resolution CT images of a mouse femur and a mouse vertebra to calculate the dose gradients within the bone marrow (BM) compartment of mice based on different radiation beam qualities relevant to x-ray and isotope type irradiators. Results and findings indicated that soft x-ray beams (160 kV at 0.62 mm Cu HVL and 320 kV at 1 mm Cu HVL) lead to substantially higher dose to BM within close proximity to mineral bone (within about 60 µm) as compared to hard x-ray beams (320 kV at 4 mm Cu HVL) and isotope based gamma irradiators (137Cs). The average dose increases to the BM in the vertebra for these four aforementioned radiation beam qualities were found to be 31%, 17%, 8%, and 1%, respectively. Both in-vitro and in-vivo experimental studies confirmed these simulation results, demonstrating that the 320 kV, 1 mm Cu HVL beam caused statistically significant increased killing to the BM cells at 6 Gy dose levels in comparison to both the 320 kV, 4 mm Cu HVL and the 662 keV, 137Cs beams.

Enhanced proton flux in the MeV range by defocused laser irradiation

Thin Al foils (50 nm and 6 mu m) were irradiated at intensities of up to 2x10(19) W cm(-2) using high contrast (10(8)) laser pulses. Ion emission from the rear of the targets was measured using a scintillator-based Thomson parabola and beam sampling 'footprint' monitor. The variation of the ion spectra and beam profile with focal spot size was systematically studied. The results show that while the maximum proton energy is achieved around tight focus for both target thicknesses, as the spot size increases the ion flux at lower energies is seen to peak at significantly increased spot sizes. Measurements of the proton footprint, however, show that the off-axis proton flux is highest at tight focus, indicating that a previously identified proton deflection mechanism may alter the on-axis spectrum. One-dimensional particle-in-cell modelling of the experiment supports our hypothesis that the observed change in spectra with focal spot size is due to the competition of two effects: decrease in laser intensity and an increase in proton emission area.