Discrimination of Particles by the Scintillation Pulse Shape (in the Electron Energy Range of 0.5-4.0 MeV) Using the Zero-Crossing Method

摘要

The ratios of the fast to slow components of scintillation pulses produced by neutrons and γ rays have been calculated on the basis of experimental data for several energies in the range of 0.5-4.0 MeV of the electron equivalent. The procedure for discriminating between neutrons and y rays by measuring the zero-crossing time of a bipolar pulse formed by RC circuits has been simulated for organic scintillators using the Monte Carlo method in the range of 0.012-4.000 MeV of the electron equivalent. It is shown that pulse shape discrimination of particles based on the zero-crossing technique allows rejection of y-ray background down to a level of 10~(-4) at particle energies of > 100 keV of the electron equivalent (for energies of <50 keV, the γ-ray background is suppressed to a level of 10~(-1) - 10~(-2) and this technique becomes ineffective in principle).