Non-destructive analysis of materials by neutron resonance transmission

摘要

In this paper a non-destructive technique Neutron Resonance Transmission Analysis (NRTA) is presented and demonstrated. The technique has been applied at the Time-Of-Flight facility GELINA of the Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements at Geel in Belgium to characterize a radioactive PbI_2 sample, which was used to study the transmutation capabilities of ~(129)I. A transmission experiment divided into three measuring sequences allowed the identification and quantification of light (~(16)O, ~(23)Na and ~(32)S) and heavy nuclei (~(127)I, ~(206)Pb, ~(207)Pb and ~(208)Pb) with an accuracy better than 7%. In addition, an upper limit of the hydrogen content was deduced from the attenuation of the neutron beam by the non-resonant scattering contribution.