A deadtime reduction circuit for thermal neutron coincidence counters with Amptek preamplifiers

Conference · Mon Aug 01 04:00:00 EDT 1994

OSTI ID:10171507

Bourret, S C; Krick, M S

We have developed a deadtime reduction circuit for thermal neutron coincidence counters using Amptek preamplifier/amplifier/discriminator circuits. The principle is to remove the overlap between the output pulses from the Amptek circuits by adding a derandomizer between the Amptek circuits and the shift-register coincidence electronics. We implemented the derandomizer as an Actel programmable logic array; the derandomizer board is small and can be mounted in the high-voltage junction box with the Amptek circuits, if desired. Up to 32 Amptek circuits can be used with one derandomizer. The derandomizer has seven outputs: four groups of eight inputs, two groups of 16 inputs, and one group of 32 inputs. We selected these groupings to facilitate detector ring-ratio measurements. The circuit was tested with the five-ring research multiplicity counter, which has five output signals-one for each ring. The counter`s deadtime was reduced from 70 to 30 ns.

• Research Organization: Los Alamos National Lab., NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: W-7405-ENG-36
• OSTI ID: 10171507
• Report Number(s): LA-UR--94-2271; CONF-940748--72; ON: DE94016074
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

055001
42 ENGINEERING
426000
440101
46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
98 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT, SAFEGUARDS, AND PHYSICAL PROTECTION
COINCIDENCE CIRCUITS
COINCIDENCE METHODS
COMPONENTS
ELECTRON DEVICES AND CIRCUITS
DEAD TIME
DISCRIMINATORS
GENERAL DETECTORS OR MONITORS AND RADIOMETRIC INSTRUMENTS
NUCLEAR MATERIALS MANAGEMENT
PREAMPLIFIERS
TECHNICAL ASPECTS
THERMAL NEUTRONS