Determining Pu isotopic composition and Pu content of PuBe sources by neutron coincidence technique

✍ Scribed by Cong Tam Nguyen; Janos Bagi; Laszlo Lakosi

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2007
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 455 KB
• Volume: 262
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0168-583X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.nimb.2007.05.005

✦ Synopsis

The paper describes a pure neutron method for determining both Pu content and Pu isotopic composition of PuBe neutron sources by neutron coincidence technique, without using gamma-spectrometry. The new procedure based on the R/T-T relationship is a developed version of the R/T-method based on R/T-M Pu calibration curve described in [C.T. Nguyen, J. Bagi, L. Lakosi, A novel method of quantitative assay of PuBe neutron sources by neutron coincidence technique, Nucl. Instr. and Meth. B 246 ( 2006) 409], utilizing Pu isotopic correlations; here R, T, M Pu are double count rate, single count rate and total Pu content, respectively. Accuracy of the method was found to be about 2-3% and 15% for 239 Pu component and Pu content, respectively. Measurement time as a function of detector efficiency is treated in detail. It is shown that in a system of frame, a transuranium neutron source can be characterized by a pair of coordinates [R/T, T].