• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제52권10호
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• pp.2346-2352
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• 2020

Dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (DXA) is the noninvasive method to diagnose osteoporosis disease characterized by low bone mass and deterioration of bone tissue. Many global companies and research groups have developed the various DXA detectors using a direct photon-counting detector such as a cadmium zinc telluride (CZT) sensor. However, this approach using CZT sensor has some drawback such as the limitation of scalability by high cost and the loss of efficiency due to the requirement of a thin detector. In this study, a SiPM based DXA system was developed and its performance evaluated experimentally. The DXA detector was composed of a SiPM sensor coupled with a single LYSO scintillation crystal (3 × 3 × 2 ㎣). The prototype DXA detector was mounted on the dedicated front-end circuit consisting of a voltage-sensitive preamplifier, pulse shaping amplifier and constant fraction discriminator (CFD) circuit. The SiPM based DXA detector showed the 34% (at 59 keV) energy resolution with good BMD accuracy. The proposed SiPM based DXA detector showed the performance comparable to the conventional DXA detector based on CZT.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제53권10호
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• pp.3421-3430
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• 2021

Spherical NaI(Tl) detectors are used in gamma-ray spectrometry, where the gamma emissions come from the nuclei with energies in the range from a few keV up to 10 MeV. A spherical detector is aimed to give a good response to photons, which depends on their direction of travel concerning the detector center. Some distortions in the response of a gamma-ray detector with a different geometry can occur because of the non-uniform position of the source from the detector surface. The present work describes the calibration of a NaI(Tl) spherical detector using both an experimental technique and a numerical simulation method (NSM). The NSM is based on an efficiency transfer method (ETM, calculating the effective solid angle, the total efficiency, and the full-energy peak efficiency). Besides, there is a high probability for a source-to-detector distance less than 15 cm to have pulse coincidence summing (CS), which may occur when two successive photons of different energies from the same source are detected within a very short response time. Therefore, γ-γ ray CS factors are calculated numerically for a ¹⁵²Eu radioactive cylindrical source. The CS factors obtained are applied to correct the measured efficiency values for the radioactive volumetric source at different energies. The results show a good agreement between the NSM and the experimental values (after correction with the CS factors).

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제52권7호
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• pp.1355-1366
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• 2020

A review of the documentation and an interpretation of the NEA-1517/74 and NEA-1517/80 shielding benchmarks (measurements of photon leakage flux from a hollow sphere with a central 14 MeV neutron source) from the SINBAD database with the Monte Carlo code MCS and the most up-to-date ENDF/B-VIII.0 neutron data library are conducted. The two analyzed benchmarks describe satisfactorily the energy resolution of the photon detector and the geometry of the spherical samples with inner beam tube, tritium target and cooling water circuit, but lack information regarding the detector geometry and the distances of shields and collimators relatively to the neutron source and the detector. Calculations are therefore conducted for a sphere model only. A preliminary verification of MCS neutron-photon calculations against MCNP6.2 is first conducted, then the impact of modelling the inner beam tube, tritium target and cooling water circuit is assessed. Finally, a comparison of calculated results with the libraries ENDF/B-VII.1 and ENDF/B-VIII.0 against the measurements is conducted and shows reasonable agreement. The MCS and MCNP inputs used for the interpretation are available as supplementary material of this article.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제53권6호
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• pp.1947-1954
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• 2021

In the nuclear medicine imaging, quality control (QC) process using quadrant bar phantom is fundamental aspect of evaluating the spatial resolution. In addition, QC process of gamma camera is performed by daily or weekly. Recently, Monte Carlo simulation using the Geant4 application for tomographic emission (GATE) is widely applied in the pre-clinical nuclear medicine field for modeling gamma cameras with pixelated cadmium telluride (CdTe) semiconductor detector. In this study, we modeled a pixelated CdTe semiconductor detector and quadrant bar phantom (0.5, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0 mm bar thicknesses) using the GATE tool. Similarity analysis based on correlation coefficients and peak signal-to-noise ratios was performed to compare image qualities for various source to collimator distances (0, 2, 4, 6, and 8 cm) and collimator lengths (0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8, and 1.0 cm). To this end, we selected reference images based on collimator length and source to collimator distance settings. The results demonstrate that as the collimator length increases and the source to collimator distance decreases, the similarity to reference images improves. Therefore, our simulation results represent valuable information for the modeling of CdTe-based semiconductor gamma imaging systems and QC phantoms in the field of nuclear medicine.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제55권9호
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• pp.3506-3513
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• 2023

In this paper, we demonstrate the neutron attenuation of dry cask shielding materials using the S670e helium-4 detector manufactured by Arktis Radiation Ltd. In particular, two materials expected to be applied to the TN-32 dry cask manufactured by ORANO Korea and KORAD-21 by the Korea Radioactive Waste Agency (KORAD) were utilized. The measured neutron attenuation was compared with our Monte Carlo N-Particle Transport simulation results, and the difference is given as the root mean square (RMS). For the fast neutron case, a rapid decline in neutron counts was observed as a function of increasing material thickness, exhibiting an exponential relationship. The discrepancy between the experimentally acquired data and simulation results for the fast neutron was maintained within a 2.3% RMS. In contrast, the observed thermal neutron count demonstrated an initial rise, attained a maximum value, and exhibited an exponential decline as a function of increasing thickness. In particular, the discrepancy between the measured and simulated peak locations for thermal neutrons displayed an RMS deviation of approximately 17.3-22.4%. Finally, the results suggest that a minimum thickness of 5 cm for Li-6 is necessary to achieve a sufficiently significant cross-section, effectively capturing incoming thermal neutrons within the dry cask.

• 한국원자력학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국원자력학회 1996년도 춘계학술발표회논문집(1)
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• pp.197-201
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• 1996

In the detail reaction-rate measurements in a critical assembly using the foil activation method, the measured activations of detector foils have inevitably errors caused by detector foil self-shielding effect. If neutron flux could be approximated to Westcott flux: i.e. well thermalized Maxwellian distribution, these activations of detector foil could be corrected to represent the unperturbated flux at any detected position in the cell with using Westcott option and reaction-rate option of the lattice code, WIMS-AECL. These calculated detector material self-shielding correction factors of the tested fuel, CANFLEX provided much information about neutron spectrum of test lattice cell as well as the correction factors themselves. The results could be verified by another lattice calculations.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제52권3호
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• pp.538-543
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• 2020

Boric acid is used as a coolant for pressurized-water reactors, and the degree of burnup is controlled by the concentration of boric acid. Therefore, accurate measurement of the concentration of boric acid is an important factor in reactor safety. An improved system was proposed for the accurate determination of boron concentration. A new boron-concentration measurement technique, called multisensitive detection, was developed to improve the measurement accuracy of boron meters. In previous studies, laboratory-scale experiments were performed based on different sensitivity detectors, confirming a 65% better accuracy than conventional single-detector boron meters. Based on these experimental results, an experimental system simulating the coolant-circulation environment in the reactor was constructed; accuracy analysis of the boron meter with a multisensitivity detector was performed at the actual coolant pressure and temperature. In this study, the boron concentration conversion equation was derived from the calibration test, and the accuracy of the boron concentration conversion equation was examined through a repeatability test. Through the experiment, it was confirmed that the accuracy was up to 87.5% higher than the conventional single-detector boron meter.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제52권7호
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• pp.1503-1510
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• 2020

Ultra-low noise charge sensitive amplifiers (CSAs) based on various types of circuit board substrates, such as FR4, Teflon, and ceramics (Al₂O₃) with two different designs, PA1 and PA2, have been developed. They were tested to see the noise effect from the dielectric loss of the substrate capacitance before and after irradiation. If the electronic noise from the CSAs is to be minimized and the energy resolution enhanced, the shaping time has to be optimized for the detector, and a small feedback capacitance of the CSA is favorable for a better SNR. Teflon- and ceramic-based PA1 design CSAs showed better noise performance than the FR4-based one, but the Teflon-based PA1 design showed better sensitivity than ceramic based one at a low detector capacitance (<10 pF). In the PA2 design, the equivalent noise and the sensitivity were 0.52 keV FWHM for a silicon detector and 7.2 mV/fC, respectively, with 2 ㎲ peaking time and 0.1 pF detector capacitance. After 10, 100, 10³, 10⁴, and 10⁵ Gy irradiation the ENC and sensitivity characteristics of the developed CSAs based on three different substrate materials are also discussed.

• 한국원자력학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국원자력학회 2005년도 춘계학술발표회
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• pp.1349-1350
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• 2005

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제41권5호
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• pp.723-728
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• 2009

The response property of the CZT detector ($5{\times}5{\times}5\;mm^3$), widely used in photon spectroscopy, was evaluated by considering the charge collection efficiency, which depends on the interaction position of incident radiation, A quantitative analysis of the energy spectra obtained from the CZT detector was also performed to investigate the tail effect at the low energy side of the full energy peak. The collection efficiency of electrons and holes to the two electrodes (i.e., cathode and anode) was calculated from the Hecht equation, and radiation transport analysis was performed by two Monte Carlo codes, Geant4 and MCNPX. The radiation source was assumed to be 59.5 keV gamma rays emitted from a $^{241}Am$ source into the cathode surface of this detector, and the detector was assumed to be biased to 500 V between the two electrodes. Through the comparison of the results between the Geant4 calculation considering the charge collection efficiency and the ideal case from MCNPX, an pronounced difference of 4 keV was found in the full energy peak position. The tail effect at the low energy side of the full energy peak was confirmed to be caused by the collection efficiency of electrons and holes. In more detail, it was shown that the tail height caused by the charge collection efficiency went up to 1000 times the pulse height in the same energy bin at the calculation without considering the charge collection efficiency. It is, therefore, apparent that research considering the charge collection efficiency is necessary in order to properly analyze the characteristics of CZT detectors.