Development of New High Transparency Pb-Free Radiation Shielding Glass

Abstract

This experimental research aimed to development of new high transparency non-lead radiation shielding properties of the borosilicate glasses in the composition of xBaO: (40-x)SiO2: 25ZnO: 30B2O3: 5Al2O3 where x is the percent by mol of barium oxide of borosilicate glasses. All of glasses were prepared by melt quenching technique. The glasses were investigated physical properties, optical properties, and radiation shielding properties. The density of the glasses was measured by Archimedes’ principle. The optical property was measured by the UV-spectrometer, the XRD analysis have been used to confirm the phase (crystalline or amorphous). The mass attenuation coefficients, the effective atomic number, and the effective electron densities were measured at 662 keV of the energy by using the gamma-ray transmission technique from the 137Cs source. The theoretical values of radiation shielding were calculated by WinXCom program and compared with the experimental values. The results showed that the density and molar volume of the glasses were increased with the increasing of percent by mol of BaO. The results of optical properties found out that the sample glass is shown to have turned transparent yellow at the higher wavelength. The results of radiation shielding properties showed that mass attenuation coefficients, effective atomic numbers, effective electron densities, and lead equivalence thickness have trivial increases when the BaO is added. The half value layers (HVL) were decreases with the increasing of BaO content and also the energy absorption buildup factor coefficients (EABF) and exposure buildup factor (EBF) were studied.