Effect of Barium and Rare-Earth Oxides on the X-ray and Fast Neutron Shielding Properties of Borate Glasses

Abstract This study aimed to investigate the effect of the variation of the concentrations of BaO, La 2 O 3 and Nd 2 O 3 on the x-ray and fast neutron shielding efficiency of the glass system B 2 O 3 -TiO 2 -BaO-ZnO-La 2 O 3 -Nd 2 O 3 utilizing the Phy-X/PSD software. It was observed that the glass sample 48B 2 O 3 -9TiO 2 -13BaO-26ZnO-2La 2 O 3 -2Nd 2 O 3 (S4) demonstrated the highest linear attenuation coefficient (LAC) (0.554—156.711 cm −1 ), mass attenuation coefficient (MAC) (0.137—38.790 cm 2 g −1 ), effective atomic number (Z eff ) (15.66—37.92) and effective electron density N eff (only at energy > 0.06 MeV). In the same vein, it exhibited the lowest half value layer (HVT), tenth value layer (TVT) and mean free path (MFP) which varied from 0.004—1.252 cm, 0.015—4.158 cm and 0.006—1.806 cm respectively. The trend S1 > S2 > S3 > S4 was observed for fast neutron removal cross section (FNRCS), while the reverse S4 > S3 > S2 > S1 was noticed for T ½ , T 10 , and λ of fast neutrons. Consequently, glass sample S4 has emerged as the most efficient x-ray shielding glass while glass sample S1 has proven to be a favourable fast neutron shielding glass among the four glass samples considered in this study. In essence, incorporating barium and rare earth oxides into borate glasses is advised for x-ray shielding but they have negligible effect on the fast- neutron shielding property of the glasses.