Pulse shape discrimination of CLYC, CLLBC and EJ-276 with SiPM readout

Abstract

Solid state detectors for the detection of thermal and fast neutrons find widespread applications. They often operate in a high gamma-radiation field or are required to discriminate between gamma-radiation and neutrons. Organic and in-organic scintillation materials are proposed as detector materials. These materials often exhibit different pulse shapes in their light output, which allows a variety of pulse shape analysis (PSA) techniques to be used to distinguish the two species of radiation. The current maturity of silicon based single photon counters (SiPM) provides a viable visible photon detector alternative to conventional vacuum based photo multiplier tubes (PMT). However, their impact on PSA has not been deeply studied. Three solid state scintillation materials, CLYC, CLLBC and EJ-276 are coupled to an array of SiPM and exposed to neutron and gamma radiation. Their response is characterized using a variety of PSA algorithms and quantified in a Figure of Merit. Conventional charge comparison algorithms perform well for all materials, while a Fourier component analysis shows particular strength for the in-organic materials tested.