SBIR/STTR Award attributes
Cost effective scintillators with high density, fast decay (< 10ns) is needed in large volumes to enhance and advance calorimetry in High Energy Physics experiments. These materials are also expected to be radiation hard up to 100 Mrad to withstand higher doses at future colliders. Inorganic scintillating glass that can be produced in large sizes and emit in wavelengths that can be detected with commercially available silicon photo multipliers are a great choice. To address the needs of fast and dense scintillator we propose to develop a Yb2O3 doped (La,Lu)2O3-(Ga,Al)2O3 glass system based on our previous work on Yb doped Lu2O3 material. The average density is expected to be ~6.5 g/cm3, with a fast scintillation decay characterized by the Yb charge transfer transition. The wide band gaps of components will also allow for enhanced detection of ultra-fast Cherenkov photons. As the charge transfer scintillation has a large Stokes shift there is no reabsorption of Cherenkov photons. The research of Phase I will focus on the feasibility demonstration. We will design, produce, and characterize samples from the (La,Lu)2O3-(Ga,Al)2O3 glass system and will also perform compositional optimization. Other components may be added to lower the production temperatures or increase density without compromises to the key properties. Light yield, decay time, and radiation hardness will be studied. In addition to high energy physics applications, dense, ultra-fast and radiation hard materials would be attractive for high count rate applications such as nuclear fuel monitoring, dosimetry, detectors for measuring radiation in the event of a nuclear blast. The proposed material can deliver performance that surpasses the benchmark materials at potentially lower cost.
