Regensburg 2007 – scientific programme
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ST: Fachverband Strahlen- und Medizinphysik
ST 5: Strahlendetektoren
ST 5.1: Talk
Tuesday, March 27, 2007, 09:30–09:45, Ch 12.0.16
Nanocrystalline Glass Ceramics for Radiation Imaging — •Graham Appleby1, Andy Edgar2, and Grant Williams3 — 1Institute of Materials Science, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Darmstadt, Germany — 2MacDiarmid Institute, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand — 3Industrial Research Limited, Wellington, New Zealand
Commercial solid state detectors of radiation such as x-rays, gamma rays and neutrons are often based on scintillator screens or imaging plates which consist of a crystalline luminescent material suspended within a supporting layer. For example, x-ray imaging plates consist of micron-sized crystallites of the storage phosphor BaFBr:Eu2+ within a polymer layer.
The main limitation of such materials is the poor spatial resolution of the images obtained, which arises from light scattering from the crystal grains. To overcome this problem, new detectors are under development in which nanocrystallites of a luminescent material are grown within a glass matrix. The transparent nature of these glass-ceramics leads to a reduction in light scattering and therefore improved spatial resolution.
Nanocrystallites of the storage phosphor BaCl2:Eu2+ have been successfully incorporated into fluorozirconate glasses for x-ray imaging plates, and into neutron sensitive lithium borate glasses for thermal neutron imaging plates. An overview of the structural and radiation imaging characteristics of these materials will be given in this presentation.