Design and implementation of the monochromator shielding for the cold neutron spectrometers XINGZHI and BOYA

An innovative monochromator shielding is designed and implemented for the cold neutron spectrometers XINGZHI and BOYA operated by Renmin University of China at China Advanced Research Reactor.Via Monte Carlo simulations and careful mechanical designs,a shielding configuration has been successfully developed to satisfy safety requirements of below 3μSv/h dose rate at its exterior,meanwhile fulfilling space,floor load and nonmagnetic requirements.Composite materials are utilized to form the sandwich-type shielding walls:the inner layer of boron carbide rubber,the middle layer of steel-encased lead and the outer layer of borated polyethylene.Special-shaped liftable shielding blocks are incorporated to facilitate a continuous adjustment of the neutron energy while preventing radiation leakage.Our work has demonstrated that by utilizing composite shielding materials,along with the sandwich structure and liftable shielding blocks,a compact and lightweight shielding solution can be achieved.This enables the realization of advanced neutron scattering instruments that provide expanded space of measurement,larger energy and momentum coverage,and higher flux on the sample.This shielding represents the first of its kind in neutron scattering instruments in China.Following its successful operation,it has been subsequently employed by other neutron instruments across the country.

Geant4 simulation of multi-sphere spectrometer response function and the detection of 241Am–Be neutron spectrum

This paper is aimed at detecting the neutron spectrum of^(241)Am–Be, a widely used neutron source, with the SP9 ~3He proportional counter, which is a multi-sphere spectrometer system of eight thermal neutron detectors embedded in eight polyethylene(PE) spheres of varying diameters. The transport processes of a neutron in the multi-sphere spectrometer are simulated using the Geant4 code. Two sets of response functions of the PE spheres are obtained for calculating the^(241)Am–Be neutron spectrum.Response Function 1 utilizes the thermal neutron scattering model G4 Neutron HPThermal Scattering for neutron energies of ≤4 eV, and Response Function 2 has no thermal treatment. Neutron spectra of an^(241)Am–Be neutron source are measured and compared to those calculated by using the response functions. The results show that response function with thermal treatment is more accurate and closer to the real spectrum.

Correction and verification of HL-2A Tokamak Bonner sphere spectrometer in monoenergetic neutron fields from 100 keV to 5 MeV

A real-time Bonner sphere spectrometer(BSS)has been developed for spectral neutron measurements with the HL-2A Tokamak.To correct and verify the accuracy of the neutron spectrum from the BSS,the BSS system was calibrated using monoenergetic neutron beams in the energy range of 100 keV–5 MeV.The response function of the BSS was corrected based on the calibration results,and the corrected BSS system was verified by unfolding monoenergetic neutron spectra.Fusion neutron spectra on the HL-2A have been obtained from the calibrated BSS system for the first time.

Unfolding neutron spectra from water-pumping-injection multilayered concentric sphere neutron spectrometer using self-adaptive differential evolution algorithm

A self-adaptive differential evolution neutron spectrum unfolding algorithm(SDENUA)is established in this study to unfold the neutron spectra obtained from a water-pumping-injection multilayered concentric sphere neutron spectrometer(WMNS).Specifically,the neutron fluence bounds are estimated to accelerate the algorithm convergence,and the minimum error between the optimal solution and input neutron counts with relative uncertainties is limited to 10^(-6)to avoid unnecessary calculations.Furthermore,the crossover probability and scaling factor are self-adaptively controlled.FLUKA Monte Carlo is used to simulate the readings of the WMNS under(1)a spectrum of Cf-252 and(2)its spectrum after being moderated,(3)a spectrum used for boron neutron capture therapy,and(4)a reactor spectrum.Subsequently,the measured neutron counts are unfolded using the SDENUA.The uncertainties of the measured neutron count and the response matrix are considered in the SDENUA,which does not require complex parameter tuning or an a priori default spectrum.The results indicate that the solutions of the SDENUA agree better with the IAEA spectra than those of MAXED and GRAVEL in UMG 3.1,and the errors of the final results calculated using the SDENUA are less than 12%.The established SDENUA can be used to unfold spectra from the WMNS.

Development of the real-time double-ring fusion neutron time-of-flight spectrometer system at HL-2M

A real-time double-ring neutron time-of-flight(TOFII) spectrometer system has been proposed to achieve plasma diagnosis on HL-2M tokamak with a relatively high count rate and sufficient energy resolution.The TOFII system is in its development stage,and this work describes its characteristics in terms of design principle,system structure,electronic system design,preliminary tests,and neutron transport simulation.The preliminary test results illustrate that the TOFII system can demonstrate the realtime dynamic spectrum every 10 ms.The results also show that based on the support vector machine method,the n-γ discrimination algorithm achieves the discrimination accuracy of 99.1%with a figure of merit of 1.30,and the intrinsic timing resolution of the system is within 0.3%.The simulated flight time spectrums from 1 to 5 MeV are obtained through the Monte Carlo tool Geant4,which also provide the reasonable results.The TOFII system will then be calibrated on mono-energetic neutron sources for further verification.

The Design and Optimization of a Neutron Time-of-Flight Spectrometer with Double Scintillators for Neutron Diagnostics on EAST

Neutron energy spectrometry diagnosis plays an important role in magnetic con- finement fusion. A new neutron time-of-flight （TOF） spectrometer with double scintillators is designed and optimized for the EAST toknmak. A set of optimM parameters is obtained by Monte Carlo simulation, based on the GEANT4 and ROOT codes. The electronic setup of the measurement system is designed. The count rate capability is increased by introducing a flash ADC. The designed spectrometer with high resolution and efficiency is capable of being applied to fusion neutron diagnostics. Applications in mixed-energy and continuous energy neutron fields can also be considered.

Extended Bonner sphere spectrometer for dynamic neutron spectrum on HL-2A

The extended Bonner sphere spectrometer （EBSS） at the HL-2A tokamak for the neutron spectrum is described. This device was developed on the basis of previous Bonner sphere spectrometry （BSS）, aiming to obtain a more accurate neutron spectrum in the HL-2A tokamak hall. The previous BSS contained eight Bonner spheres （BS）. This EBSS contains 13 3He-filled detectors embedded in polyethylene spheres （PS）, pre-amplifiers, and a parallel processing data acquisition system （DAQ）. A response matrix is simulated in Geant4 taking the effect of the environment into account.

Neutron time-of-flight spectrometer based on HIRFL for studies of spallation reactions related to ADS project

A Neutron Time-of-Flight(NTOF) spectrometer, based at the Heavy Ion Research Facility in Lanzhou(HIRFL) was developed for studies of neutron production of proton induced spallation reactions related to the ADS project. After the presentation of comparisons between calculated spallation neutron production doubledifferential cross sections and the available experimental data, a detailed description of the NTOF spectrometer is given. Test beam results show that the spectrometer works well and data analysis procedures are established.The comparisons of the test beam neutron spectra with those of GEANT4 simulations are presented.

Simulation of Gamma-Ray and Neutron Spectrometers for Microsatellite Missions

Microsatellites have recently opened windows of frequent and low cost missions for planetary exploration. The performance of gamma-ray and neutron spectrometers on future microsatellite missions is simulated to assess the possibility of observation of hydrogen and major elements, given their concentration on the observation target. The measured elemental abundance will provide important geological constraints, and some of them may serve as space resources. Four different types of target bodies with various hydrogen concentrations in the range of 0 - 20,000 ppm are assumed as target compositions;Earth’s core, C-type, S-type and Martian meteorites. Gamma-ray and neutron emission rates show unique footprints that are related to the different elemental compositions. The starting point is the solid angle subtended between observation target and spectrometers that allow estimating the gamma-ray and neutron count rates emitted by the celestial bodies. In this work, three types of gamma-ray detectors;high-purity germanium (HPGe), CeBr3 and LaBr3(Ce), a neutron spectrometer combining a lithium glass scintillator with a boron loaded plastic scintillator and a dual mode spectrometer Cs2LiYCl6(Ce) (CLYC) are simulated, focusing on their observation backgrounds as a model case for microsatellite based measurements. The background count level of both gamma-ray (except for the LaBr3 detector) and neutron count rates was negligible under these particular conditions. The gamma-ray detectors were compared by the figure of merit, which was determined by their efficiency and energy resolution. It was found that each detector has unique advantages. The HPGe detector has the highest figure of merit due to its excellent energy resolution, whereas the CLYC detector is low in weight and power consumption due to its dual sensitivity to gamma-ray and neutron. The CeBr3 detector is an intermediate choice. The neutron count rates are calculated separately in three energy ranges, i.e. , thermal (<0.5 eV), epithermal (0.5 eV - 500 keV), and fast (>500 keV), as a function of the hydrogen concentration in the 0 - 20,000 ppm range. The thermal and epithermal neutron count rates are found to decrease with hydrogen concentration, while the fast neutron count rate increases with the target average atomic mass. The optimal detector should be decided by the mission restraints on mass, power consumption, and heat thermal design.

The study of a neutron spectrum unfolding method based on particle swarm optimization combined with maximum likelihood expectation maximization

The neutron spectrum unfolding by Bonner sphere spectrometer(BSS) is considered a complex multidimensional model,which requires complex mathematical methods to solve the first kind of Fredholm integral equation. In order to solve the problem of the maximum likelihood expectation maximization(MLEM) algorithm which is easy to suffer the pitfalls of local optima and the particle swarm optimization(PSO) algorithm which is easy to get unreasonable flight direction and step length of particles, which leads to the invalid iteration and affect efficiency and accuracy, an improved PSO-MLEM algorithm, combined of PSO and MLEM algorithm, is proposed for neutron spectrum unfolding. The dynamic acceleration factor is used to balance the ability of global and local search, and improves the convergence speed and accuracy of the algorithm. Firstly, the Monte Carlo method was used to simulated the BSS to obtain the response function and count rates of BSS. In the simulation of count rate, four reference spectra from the IAEA Technical Report Series No. 403 were used as input parameters of the Monte Carlo method. The PSO-MLEM algorithm was used to unfold the neutron spectrum of the simulated data and was verified by the difference of the unfolded spectrum to the reference spectrum. Finally, the 252Cf neutron source was measured by BSS, and the PSO-MLEM algorithm was used to unfold the experimental neutron spectrum.Compared with maximum entropy deconvolution(MAXED), PSO and MLEM algorithm, the PSO-MLEM algorithm has fewer parameters and automatically adjusts the dynamic acceleration factor to solve the problem of local optima. The convergence speed of the PSO-MLEM algorithm is 1.4 times and 3.1 times that of the MLEM and PSO algorithms. Compared with PSO, MLEM and MAXED, the correlation coefficients of PSO-MLEM algorithm are increased by 33.1%, 33.5% and 1.9%, and the relative mean errors are decreased by 98.2%, 97.8% and 67.4%.

Calculation of Response Function for Bonner Sphere Spectrometer Based on Geant4

In order to make further studies on fusion neutron diagnosis on HL-2A /HL-2M,we have developed and succeeded in the calculation of the Response Function for a Bonner sphere spectrometer,which consists of eight polyethylene spheres with ^3He proportional counters inside.The response function of the Bonner spectrometer to neutrons is of fundamental importance for its neutron spectrum unfolding procedure and is directly related to the quality of the unfolded spectrum.In this paper,we calculated the response function to neutrons from 10^-9 MeV to100 MeV by Geant4.In order to test the accuracy of the Geant4 simulation,we apply it to measure an ^241Am-Be neutron source,and the measured neutron counts of the spectrometer and simulated counts are found to be highly consistent,with a relative error up to 9.3%.This has proven the calculation of the neutron response of the Bonner sphere spectrometer by Geant4 to be quite accurate.

基于半经验法多球中子谱仪校准

基于半经验法扣除中子散射本底,提出了一种多球中子谱仪校准的新方法。首先用热中子参考辐射装置校准多球中子谱仪各中子球内He-3正比计数器的探测效率。用多球中子谱仪各中子球单独测量参考^(241)Am-Be中子源,结合半经验法扣除散射,给出了各中子球的注量响应。结合两者实验结果,获得^(241)Am-Be源能谱并给出谱仪注量响应。结果表明,校准的多球中子谱仪具备快中子区测量能力。

集成式多球中子谱仪球球干扰影响

模拟计算了集成式多球中子谱仪7路测量通道同时工作与每路测量通道独立测量时的能量响应函数。两种测量模式的能响比值结果显示,球球干扰的影响随着慢化球尺寸增大而减小;对小尺寸慢化球球球干扰随着中子能量增大而增大。

Studies on unfolding energy spectra of neutrons using maximumlikelihood expectation–maximization method

Energy spectra of neutrons are important for identification of unknown neutron sources and for determination of the equivalent dose. Although standard energy spectra of neutrons are available in some situations, e.g., for some radiotherapy treatment machines, they are unknown in other cases, e.g., for photoneutrons created in radiotherapy rooms and neutrons generated in nuclear reactors. In situations where neutron energy spectra need to be determined, unfolding the required neutron energy spectra using the Bonner sphere spectrometer (BSS) and nested neutron spectrometer (NNS) has been found promising. However, without any prior knowledge on the spectra, the unfolding process has remained a tedious task. In this work, a standalone numerical tool named ‘‘NRUunfold’’ was developed which could satisfactorily unfold neutron spectra for BSS or NNS, or any other systems using similar detection methodology. A generic and versatile algorithm based on maximum-likelihood expectation– maximization method was developed and benchmarked against the widely used STAY’SL algorithm which was based on the least squares method. The present method could output decent results in the absence of precisely calculated initial guess, although it was also remarked that employment of exceptionally bizarre initial spectra could lead to some unreasonable output spectra. The neutron count rates computed using the manufacturer’s response functions were used for sensitivity studies. The present NRUunfold code could be useful for neutron energy spectrum unfolding for BSS or NNS applications in the absence of a precisely calculated initial guess.

The effects of fast neutron irradiation on oxygen in Czochralski silicon

The effects of fast neutron irradiation on oxygen atoms in Czochralski silicon （CZ-Si） are investigated systemically by using Fourier transform infrared （FTIR） spectrometer and positron annihilation technique （PAT）. Through isochronal annealing, it is found that the trend of variation in interstitial oxygen concentration （[Oi]） in fast neutrons irradiated CZ-Si fluctuates largely with temperature increasing, especially between 500 and 700℃. After the CZ-Si is annealed at 600℃, the V4 appearing as three-dimensional vacancy clusters causes the formation of the molecule-like oxygen clusters, and more importantly these dimers with small binding energies （0.1-1.0eV） can diffuse into the Si lattices more easily than single oxygen atoms, thereby leading to the strong oxygen agglomerations. When the CZ-Si is annealed at temperature increasing up to 700℃, three-dimensional vacancy clusters disappear and the oxygen agglomerations decompose into single oxygen atoms （O） at interstitial sites. Results from FTIR spectrometer and PAT provide an insight into the nature of the [Oi] at temperatures between 500 and 700℃. It turns out that the large fluctuation of [Oi] after short-time annealing from 500 to 700℃ results from the transformation of fast neutron irradiation defects.

Neutron Imaging by Boric Acid

In this paper a new type of passive neutron detector based on the already existing one, CR39, is described. Its operation was verified by three different neutron sources: an Americium-Beryllium (Am241-Be) source;a TRIGA type nuclear reactor;and a fast neutron reactor called TAPIRO. The obtained results, reported here, positively confirm its operation and the accountability of the new developed detecting technique.

基于碳化硼慢化体和涂硼微结构中子探测器的通用中子能谱仪设计和解谱方法研究

本文提出了一种基于碳化硼慢化体和涂硼微结构中子探测器的通用中子能谱仪设计方法,获得了计算最优慢化体厚度和探测器响应函数的通用公式,并用蒙特卡罗方法进行了验证和修正,可实现对中子能谱仪的快速设计.该类能谱仪可实现各中子响应函数之间的解耦,使每个探测器对各个分立能量区间的中子最为敏感,具有较强适用性和灵活性.基于该方法,我们设计了一个用于硼中子俘获治疗(BNCT)超热中子能谱测量的能谱仪,通过Gravel算法实现了中子能谱解析,并提出了一种具有良好普适性的基于响应函数的预置谱设置方法.结果表明,该能谱仪对单能中子的峰位解析精度约为1%,对BNCT连续谱的解析均方差约为0.76%,具有较大技术优势和可行性.

中国散裂中子源工程材料中子衍射谱仪尖嘴型中子准直光阑的研制

中国散裂中子源(CSNS)工程材料中子衍射谱仪(EMD)的样品非常大,且形状各异,有些样品甚至是曲面的,中子准直光阑(狭缝)要靠近这些异形构件,需要设计成尖嘴型。狭缝的主要作用是给样品测试提供所需要的束流尺寸,并保证束流尺寸精度很高,束流没有太多杂散中子。工程材料中子衍射谱仪的尖嘴型狭缝为连续型,开口可以根据实验需求进行变化。狭缝采用双导轨结构,定位精度高,重复定位精度优于10μm,绝对定位精度优于30μm。狭缝刀片采用富集碳化硼,较大程度减小了刀片的厚度,可以有效降低狭缝悬臂结构的变形量,保证狭缝有足够长度的尖嘴,能够接近异形构件,特别能够深入到长管内部,提高了工程材料中子衍射谱仪的实验能力。狭缝采取双重安全设计:导轨互换系统和防撞结构,可以有效防止狭缝在使用过程中被大件样品撞坏。该狭缝已经应用到中国散裂中子源工程材料中子衍射谱仪的实验测试,为残余应力测量做出了重要贡献,它的应用为国内外尖嘴型狭缝的设计提供了非常重要的参考。