Plastic scintillators with 1-phenyl-3-(mesityl)-2-pyrazoline as unique fluorophore for efficient neutron/gamma pulse shape discrimination

Fabrice Bisaro (1) , Alya Inial (1) , Jérémie Gatignol (1) , Florent Allix (1) , Aurélie Stallivieri (1) , Jean-Luc Renaud (1) , Lynda Achouri (2) , Marian Parlog (2, 3) , Franck Delaunay (2) , Thi-Nhàn Pham (1) , Matthieu Hamel (4) , Sylvain Gaillard (1)

1 LCMT - Laboratoire de chimie moléculaire et thioorganique
2 LPCC - Laboratoire de physique corpusculaire de Caen
3 Horia Hulubei National Institute for Physics and Nuclear Engineering
4 LCAE (CEA, LIST) - Laboratoire Capteurs et Architectures Electroniques (CEA, LIST)

The development of highly efficient plastic scintillators for neutron/gamma pulse shape discrimination is a matter of current interest. This is generally achieved using two fluorophores, with one of them being added to the polymer formulation at a concentration higher than typically 15 weight percent (wt%). Here, we report our results concerning the development of highly performant poly(vinyltoluene)-based (PVT) plastic scintillators for efficient fast neutron/gamma pulse shape discrimination, using 1-phenyl-3-(mesityl)-2-pyrazoline (1) as the only guest fluorophore. On our route during this study, the synthesis of the compound 1 has been revisited. Analysis and evaluation of the radioluminescence properties of these novel PVT-based plastic scintillators containing compound 1 are also described. In particular their light output and neutron/gamma discrimination ability were characterized. The sample doped with 15 wt% of compound 1 has a light output of 0.65 relative to EJ-200 and a neutron/gamma discrimination figure of merit of 0.84 in the range 450–500 keVee.

Mots clés: instrumentation; nuclear instrumentation; plastic scintillator; Neutron-gamma discrimination; fluorophore; polymer; pyrazoline; radioluminescence; doping

Domaines: Instrumentations et Détecteurs [physics.ins-det]; Physique Nucléaire Expérimentale [nucl-ex]

Fabrice Bisaro, Alya Inial, Jérémie Gatignol, Florent Allix, Aurélie Stallivieri, et al.. Plastic scintillators with 1-phenyl-3-(mesityl)-2-pyrazoline as unique fluorophore for efficient neutron/gamma pulse shape discrimination. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment, 2022, 1030, pp.166469. ⟨10.1016/j.nima.2022.166469⟩. ⟨cea-04026308⟩