Parker, A.J. and Bandala, M. and Croft, S. and Crouch, L. and Dunphy, R.D. and Hutchinson, D. and Logsdon, R. and Ma, X. and Marshall, S. and Murray, P. and Sarfraz, A. and Stirzaker, P. and Taylor, J. and Zabalza, J. and Joyce, M.J. (2024) Enrichment measurement by passive γ-ray spectrometry of uranium dioxide fuel pellets using a europium-doped, strontium iodide scintillator. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research, Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment, 1062: 169191.
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
The performance of a europium-doped strontium iodide scintillator for uranium enrichment measurement of a variety of sintered uranium dioxide fuel pellets is described and compared to that of caesium iodide and sodium iodide. Enrichment has been determined via passive γ-ray spectrometry of the 186 keV line from uranium-235 using gross count, net count, and peak ratio analyses. The 38 mm Ø x 38 mm strontium iodide crystal demonstrates superior energy resolution (3.43 ± 0.03% at 662 keV) and competitive detection efficiency for its size in the energy range of interest for uranium enrichment analysis (<250 keV). It demonstrates better [?] and coefficient of determination values than caesium iodide and sodium iodide when measuring uranium enrichment using the gross- and net-count from the 186 keV emission. It is shown to have the least measurement variance of the three scintillators studied in determining the uranium enrichment of pellets in a blind test, with a relative error comparative to sodium iodide and smaller than caesium iodide. This research heralds the potential of strontium iodide in passive γ-ray uranium enrichment applications.