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Neutron Radiography - T.Polach PDF
Neutron Radiography - T.Polach PDF
Neutron Radiography - T.Polach PDF
seminar
NEUTRON RADIOGRAPHY
Tadeja Polach
1
Contents
1 INTRODUCTION 3
3 NEUTRON SOURCES 5
3.1 ACCELERATOR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.2 RADIOACTIVE SOURCES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
3.3 NUCLEAR REACTOR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
5 DETECTION 9
5.1 PHOTOGRAPHIC DETECTION METHOD . . . . . . . . . 10
5.2 SCINTILLATOR DETECTORS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
6 APPLICATIONS 13
7 CONCLUSION 17
8 REFERENCES 19
2
1 INTRODUCTION
Neutron is a subatomic particle without a net charge, consequently Coulomb
attraction forces have no effect on it, when it travels through matter. This
fact makes it also useful for imaging applications. Neutron radiography is a
complementary method to X-ray radiography (Fig. 1). The X-ray attenua-
tion increases with higher electron density [1].
On the other hand neutrons are attenuated by light materials for example
hydrogen, boron and lithium, because they interact with the nuclei. The
reactions are absorption and scattering.. The probability for each of these
occurrences is defined by the microscopic cross section. Cross section has
the units of area and is on the order of the square of the nuclear radius. A
commonly used unit is the barn: 1 barn = 10−28 m2 . The total microscopic
cross section σ is the sum of absorption cross section σabs and scattering cross
section σsc .
σ = σabs + σsc (1)
Generally the cross section decreases proportionally to 1/v, (v is the speed
of a neutron). It means the lower the speed of a neutron, the higher is
the probability for attenuation (Fig. 2) [1]. Neutrons, like X-rays, can be
produced over a wide energy range, and each range has different attenuation
properties. The division of neutron energies into groups is listed in Table 1.
Table 1: CLASSIFICATION OF
NEUTRONS BY ENERGY [1].
cold < 0.01 eV
thermal 0.01 eV to 0.03 eV
epithermal 0.03 eV to 10,000 eV
fast 10 keV to 20 MeV
relativistic > 20 MeV
3
Figure 2: Total cross sections for some neutron reactions versus neutron
energy [3].
4
of materials. Fast neutrons have the absorption differences much reduced,
for this reason they are useful when inspecting thick materials [1].
3 NEUTRON SOURCES
Neutrons are available from three types of sources:
— accelerator
— radioactive sources
— nuclear reactor
3.1 ACCELERATOR
This method is widely used. It involves positive ion reactions in which pro-
tons (p) or deuterons (d) bombard various targets. Typical reactions are:
9
Be + d →10 B + n,
3
H + d →4 He + n,
5
2
H + d →3 He + n,
7
Li + p →7 Be + n,
2
H + d →3 He + n.
The reaction, 3 H(d,n)4 He, bombarding of tritium by deuterons (D-T reac-
tion) produces a relatively high intensity neutron source with acceleration
voltages between 150 and 400 kV, whereas other reactions require about ten
times higher acceleration voltages. The drawback of the D-T reaction is that
as it produces neutrons of relatively high energy, these are more difficult
to moderate than lower energy neutrons available from other types of reac-
tions. In each of this cases, monoenergetic neutrons are produced for a given
bombarding energy and angular direction. In accelerator-type sources neu-
trons can also be produced by bombarding suitable targets with X-rays and
gamma radiation. Therefore, electron accelerating equipment can be used as
a neutron source by allowing the X-rays formed in an electron target to irra-
diate a suitable neutron yielding material. Unfortunatly, for most materials,
the treshold X-ray energy must be higher than 8 MeV, before the neutron
yield will be obtained. However beryllium yields neutrons, when bombarded
with X-ray energies above 1.66 MeV and deuterium, when bombarded with
energies above 2.20 MeV. The neutron outputs for these reactions depend
on the electron energy of the X-ray beam and also upon the absorption of
the emitted X-rays in the target material. Since these light target materials
have little absorbing power for very high energy X-rays, a large volume of
target material must be used. This is somehow an advantage in neutron
radiography as large volumes of target material can serve both as a neutron
source and as a moderator.
Accelerator neutron sources are very useful neutron radiographic sources.
But they need a good moderator and collimator configuration [1].
6
MeV, needed to yield neutrons from beryllium and deuterium targets are
easily available, whereas sources to yield neutrons from targets with higher
treshold values are not. As very useful has proved itself the Sb-Be source.
This source has a very high yield of neutrons and the neutrons produced
have a relatively low energy, about 25 keV, so they are easily moderated [1].
7
The possible image resolution of the beam depends a lot on the collimator.
Collimator functions as a beam forming assembly, which determines the ge-
ometric properties of the beam and may also contain filters to modify the
energy spectrum of the beam or to reduce the content in gamma rays of the
beam. The the degree of divergence ∆ is expressed by equation 2:
L
∆= , (2)
D
where the symbols represent:
L. . .collimator length [cm]
D. . .diameter of the inlet aperture of the collimator [cm]
8
Figure 5: Reactions occurring when the beam reaches the sample object [6]
5 DETECTION
Various detector systems are employed in neutron radiography. Generally,
neutron radiography is sensitive to all materials interacting strongly with
neutrons and especially to arrangements where strongly interacting materials
are combined with weakly interacting materials. The detectors in use have
to be able to measure the neutron field in two dimensions perpendicular
to the beam direction. An overview about these parameters is given for
the most common systems in the following figure (Fig. 6). The inherent
detectors properties are mainly given by the detection process, which is a
nuclear reaction initiated by neutrons.
9
Creation of free charge carriers is the primary process upon which most
radiation detectors rely for their operation. Neutrons have no net charge, for
this reason can be detected either by direct collision with the nuclei and their
displacement or by nuclear interactions. Thermal neutrons have insufficient
energy available for collision displacements, therefore nuclear reactions are
the dominant process in neutron detection methods [3]. The following three
reactions have cross-sections that decrease as the square root of the neutron
energy:
3
He + n →3 H +1H + 0.764 MeV
6
Li + n →4 He +3H + 4.8 MeV
10
B + n →7 Li +4He + 2.3 MeV + 0.48 MeV (γ)
A common feature of these reactions is that the products are ejected colin-
early, and in general give rise to ionizations within several µm in solids or
mm in gases from the reaction point. In lithium the range is about 100µm.
A different type of reactions are (n,γ) resonances in which γ-ray emission is
inhibited and energy is transferred to the orbital electrons.
155
Gd + n →156 Gd + γ + conversion electrons (7.9 MeV)
157
Gd + n →158 Gd + γ + conversion electrons (8.5 MeV)
These reactions are favourable, beacuse conversion electrons emited are much
more easily stopped than γ-rays providing accurate position information.
10
from the screen. The direct exposure method is a fast detection technique.
Its disadvantage is that the film may also detect all other interferent ra-
diation, such as gamma radation in the neutron beam or that emitted by
prompt radiation reactions with the sample object or other objects in the
beam path. This disadvatange is avoided when using the transfer exposure
method (Fig. 7 right). In this way the film is not exposed to the neutron
imaging beam. The image is detected by a potentially radioactive screen.
This screen becomes radioactive proportionally to the neutron intensity at
each point of the image. It is than placed next to the photographic film away
from the neutron beam and left to decay [1].
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the neutron imaging beam. For transfer detection screens the most useful
materials are indium, samarium, dysprosium and gold. Transfer neutron
radiographs show greater contrast between areas of different neutron atten-
uations [1].
Thermal neutrons can be imaged with good resolution by photographic
film. The films are photosensitive emulsions, usually made up of silver halide
grains. The coverter screen absorbs neutrons and emits ionizing radiation to-
wards the film.There a latent image is formed, when the following chemical
reaction takes place.
radiation
Br− → Br + e− and Ag+ + e− → Ag
This is an unstable process as siver atoms produced may decay afterwards.
The decay produces electrons that recombine with bromine atoms. The
bromine atom can also attack the silver atom. Therefore, gelatine is present
in the emulsion, which accepts the bromine atom. Consequently to all rea-
sons stated above the the image resolution is much reduced [3,7].
Much better results are obtained if in place of the photographic film image
plates are used. Image plates were developed for diagnostic radiology dur-
ing the early 1980s. An image plate is about 0.5 mm thick and is composed
of a flexible plastic backing, coated with fine storage phosphorus crystals
(BaFBr:Eu2+ ) combined with an organic binder.
During the exposure neutrons are absorbed by a neutron converter, thus sec-
ondary ionizing radiation is produced. Generally fine powders such as Gd2 O3
or 6 LiF are used.The secondary radiation is absorbed in phosphorus, where
pairs electron-hole are created. Essentially the image plate is a form of elec-
tronic film, in which incoming radiation creates an integrated latent image,
which is subsequently read out. The image is retrieved by illuminating the
plate with a HeNe laser light. As the plate is stimulated by visible light,
photostimulated luminescence is emitted, whose intensity is proportional to
the neutron dose. Photostimulated luminescence is a characteristic fluores-
cence radiation from Eu2+ . The number of photons emitted is proportional
to the converted incident radiation. Afterwards the fluorescence radiation
is led through a fiber-optic cable to a photomultiplier, from where a digital
signal can be read out.
Image plates have a resolution less than 100 µm and a dynamic range much
greater than that of film, typically 105 : 1 [3,7].
12
device (CCD) system. 6 Li based materials are by far the most common. This
approach is based on the neutron capture and phosphorescence phenomena.
Phosphorescence is the luminescence produced by certain substances after
absorbing energy. In the scintillation screen the neutron is absorbed by a
high cross section neutron absorbing material. The light emitted from the
screen is reflected to the camera by a mirror, to avoid the camera to be in
the direct neutron beam, as the chip could be damaged by neutron radiation,
and focused on the CCD-chip by a lens (Fig. 8).
The method with scintillator and CCD cam-
era has some advantages over other meth-
ods: good linearity and reproducibility, high
sensitivity, high dynamical range (up to 5
103 ), high temporal resolution (offers real
time imaging). The geometrical resolution of
the CCD cameras is poorer than geometrical
resolution of the methods with radiological
films. The dynamic range and reproducibil-
ity of the image for a CCD camera can be im- Figure 8: Principle of a
proved by cooling the sensor by Peltier effect, CCD-neutron radiography
water or air circulating or liquid nitrogen [2]. detector [2].
Nevertheless, CCDs and imaging plates have the disadvantage of a slow
readout, and for the CCD camera an additional disadvantage is the loss of
light through the optical system. This can be overcome with an amorphous
silicon detector, originally developed for medical and industrial X-ray imag-
ing. This detector has a much faster readout and can be put, in contrast to
the generally used crystalline silicon, directly into the X-ray or neutron beam
without being damaged. Furthermore this type of detector does not require
any optical interface, minimizing possible light losses. The detector is oper-
ated at room temperature, which has some influence on the noise. Successful
experiments were performed with this new device, but it still needs many
improvements [8].
6 APPLICATIONS
The random differences in neutron attenuation coefficients suggest numerous
appliaction possibilities. The most common application of neutron radiog-
raphy is for nondestructive testing (NDT) of materials. It is used in many
different research areas, but mostly in industry. It is used when X-ray or
other NDT methods fail. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee for success
13
using neutrons instead of X-rays for those cases where X-ray radiography
inspections fail.
mechanical engineering: NDT is used as a part of a preventive mainte-
nance program to locate hidden defects, deteriorating conditions, corrosion,
damage due to fatigue or overstress, and any other deficiencies in the struc-
ture or systems, without having to disassemble of the whole structure. The
use of neutron radiography is especially well suited to locate areas of corro-
sion and moisture entrapments [9].
Neutron radiography provides an excellent method for the detection of resid-
ual core material in cast turbine blades. The blades (mainly made of a nickel
alloy) are checked by neutron radiography to be sure that no residual ceramic
core material is left in the internal cooling passages of the blades. For that
purpose 1 to 2% of gadolinium is added to the ceramic material, which thus
attenuates neutrons more than the relatively more transparent nickel alloy
[10].
14
Figure 10: Inspections of a steel cylinder: photograph (a), X-rays(b),
gamma-rays (c), neutrons (d) [12].
There is a worldwide need for improved methods for the scanning of cargo,
to prevent contraband of illicit drugs or explosives. In Australia a scanner is
now experimentally used, which combines fast neutron and gamma-ray radio-
graphy (FNGR) to provide high-resolution images that include information
on material composition. The machine utilises monoenergetic 14 MeV neu-
trons and a 60 Co gamma-ray source with energies 1.17 MeV and 1.33 MeV.
It works by measuring the attenuation, through the object to be imaged, of
beams of fast neutrons and gamma rays from the radiation sources to an
array of detectors. R — the ratio of the neutron and gamma-ray attenuation
coefficients, can therefore be determined directly from the measured neutron
and gamma-ray transmissions without knowing the mass of material in the
radiation beams. This ratio provides a powerful discriminator between dif-
ferent classes of material[13].
electronics: The internal structure of electric contacts can be studied by
applying a neutron absorbing grease to the surface of the contacts prior to
their closing. After closing the contacts the grease will be forced to leave the
surfaces of good contact and concentrate in the zones of bad contact and this
zones will than be detected.
Relays can be inspected to detect foreign materials that might interfere with
their operation. Mechanical connectors and assemblies can also be usefully
15
studied. The presence or absence or the displacement of sealing O-rings (Fig.
11) can be revealed by neutron radiography.
medicine: Neutrons are already used for cancer treatment, but recently
ideas are emerging to use neutron radiography to scan live soft tissues (Fig.
12) to enable an early cancer diagnosis. The problem is still the ratio between
diagnostic accuracy and dose to the patient. Carcinomes have been succes-
fully observed by neutron autoradiography of liver activated with boron (Fig.
13)[15].
16
Figure 16: Study of root growing under controlled conditions[6].
Figure 17: Radiograph of a gun from the 15th cent. X-rays (left), neutrons
(right) [17].
art: The oil paintings of Rembrandt and other artists were investigated
by a neutron autoradiography method. Contact autoradiography of the ra-
dioactive painting is made on an X-ray film and at different spots of the
painting (containing different radioisotopes) a spectral analysis of the emit-
ted gamma radiation is made. Half-lives of the particular radioisotopes are
measured as well. The autoradiographs make visible underlying structures
like preparatory sketches, conceptional changes, signatures and the individ-
ual characteristics of the artist’s brush-work to enable the work to be certified
as genuine. Using the neutron autoradiographic technique it was ascertained
that the world-renowned painting The man with the golden helmet attributed
to Rembrandt was in fact not painted by him [10].
7 CONCLUSION
This seminar describes the basics of neutron radiography and some of its
appliactions. Neutron radiography is not so common as X-ray radiography,
17
although it is already widely used throughout the world. The imaging tech-
niques and the technology used with them are under constant development,
because of its wide span of application areas.
18
8 REFERENCES
[1] H. Berger, Neutron Radiography (Elsevier Publishing Company, New
York, 1965)
[2] S. Koerner, E. Lehmann and P. Vontobel, Nuclear Instruments and Meth-
ods in Physics Research A 454, 158-164, (2000)
[3] G. C. Smith, Encyclopedia of Imaging Science & Technology, (Brookhaven
National Library, New York, 2002)
[4] N. Takenaka, T. Fujii, A. Ono, Y. Motomura, A. Turuno, Fusion Engi-
neering and Design 27, 607, (1995)
[5] M. Dinca, M. Pavelescu, C. Iorgulis, Rom. Journ. Phys. 51, 435, (2006)
[6] NEUTRA, Paul Scherrer Institut
http://neutra.web.psi.ch/What/index.html, may 2008
[7] K. K. Mishra: Development of a Thermal Neutron Imaging Facility at the
N.C. State University PULSTAR reactor, (Raleigh, 2005)
[8] M. Estermann, E. Lehmann, G. Frei, P. Vontobel, The Performance of
an Amorphous Silicon Flat Panel at NEUTRA
num.web.psi.ch/reports/2003/ASQ/ASQ27JB03flatpanelfinal.pdf, may 2008
[9] W.J. Lewis and L.G.I. Bennett, The use of Neutron Radiography in the
Inspection of Aircraft Composite Flight Control Surfaces
http://www.ndt.net/article/pacndt98/9/9.htm, may 2008
[10] J. C. Domanus, Neutron Radiography, Techniques and Applications,
(Risoe National Laboratory, Roskilde, 1987)
[11] GENRA-3
http://www.gkss.de/pages.php?page=wabtgenesysgenra-3.html, may 2008
[12] ANTARES, Technische Universitaet Muenchen
http://www.physik.tu-muenchen.de/antares/, may 2008
[13] J.E. Eberhardt, Y. Liu, S. Rainey, G.J. Roach, R.J. Stevens, B. Sowerby
and J.R. Tickner, Fast Neutron and Gamma-Ray Interrogation of Air Cargo
Containers
International Workshop on Fast Neutron Detectors and Applications
http://pos.sissa.it/cgi-bin/reader/conf.cgi?confid=25, may 2008
[14] NRAY Services Inc.
www.nray.com/, may 2008
[15] S. Altieri, Neutron capture therapy for out of body liver
http://www.pv.infn.it/Γnpdc19/T alks/V enerdi/N pdc19Altieri.pdf
[16] M. Milanese, J. Niedbalski, R. Moroso, S. Guichon, J. Supan, Dense
Plasma Focus as Collimated Source of D-D Fusion Neutron Beams for Irra-
diation Experiences and Study of Emitted Radiations
www.cfn.ist.utl.pt/17IAEATMRUSFD/proceedings.html, may 2008
[17] Igor Lengar, personal communication
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