Effect of PPO and POPOP activators on the scintillation performance of polystyrene-based scintillator

摘要

In this paper, a polystyrene-based plastic scintillator of 4.5 cm diameter and 2.5 cm length doped with 2,5-diphenyloxazole (PPO) and 1,4-bis[2-(phenyloxazolyl)]-benzene (POPOP) was synthesized using thermal polymerization reaction carried out at 120 degrees C. Optical transmittance was measured by Perkin Elmer UV-Vis NIR spectrophotometer in the wavelength region of 200-900 nm. The maximum peak of the emission spectra was obtained at 420 nm using Fluorescence spectrophotometer. The radioluminescence measurement of the synthesized sample exhibited a very strong emission band in the wavelength range from 400 to 600 nm, with a peak maximum at 420 nm for different voltages. The fabricated scintillator possessed a linear variation of intensity with respect to the voltage. The fast scintillation decay time of the fabricated plastic scintillator was investigated using gamma-rays from Cs-137 radiation source. Pulse height spectra were recorded using different gamma ray sources such as Cs-137, Co-60 and Na-22. The results showed that the above-mentioned material is a promising and a potential candidate for scintillation and neutron detection applications.