Tb <sup>3+</sup> ‐Doped Glass‐Ceramic Scintillating Plates and Fibers for X‐Ray Imaging and Flexible Detection
The development of flexible and wearable radiation detection technology is urgently needed for medical imaging, non-destructive testing, and personal dosimetry. Although bulk single-crystal and ceramic scintillators suffer from intrinsic brittleness and scalability issues, glass scintillators typically show limited light yield. To overcome these challenges, we have developed a Tb<sup>3+</sup>-doped oxyfluoride glass-ceramic scintillator via an integrated approach combining phase-diagram guidance and molecular dynamics simulations. Based on the controlled precipitation of Ba<sub>2</sub>GdF<sub>7</sub> nanocrystals, the as-prepared glass-ceramic scintillator achieves a light yield of 41 800 photons/MeV (418% of BGO). It also achieves a high X-ray imaging spatial resolution of 25.3 lp/mm with large-area scintillating plates and demonstrates exceptional thermal quenching resistance. Leveraging the superior processability of the glass matrix, we further fabricated a flexible scintillation fiber for remote, highly sensitive radiation dosimetry. The fiber sensor exhibits a sensitivity of 224 nGy/s, stability over 240 on-off irradiation cycles, and excellent linearity (R<sup>2</sup> = 0.9999). This work not only presents a robust glass-ceramic scintillator material design strategy but also demonstrates its potential in next-generation distributed radiation detection systems using large-area scintillating plates and flexible glass fibers.
Authors
- W. C. Wang
- Panpan Li (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6470-3712)
- Songxuan Liu
- Yao Ji
- Ping Zhang
- Zhiguo Xia
- Qinyuan Zhang
Institutions
- State Key Laboratory of Luminescent Materials and Devices
- South China University of Technology (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Advanced Science
- Published
- 2026-02-25
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1002/advs.74568
- Primary Topic
- Radiation Detection and Scintillator Technologies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00