The scintillation properties of cerium-doped lanthanum fluoride

Conference · Tue May 01 04:00:00 EDT 1990

OSTI ID:6733873

Moses, W W; Derenzo, S E

We report on the scintillation properties of cerium-doped lanthanum fluoride (LaF{sub 3}), a newly discovered dense (5.9 g/cm{sup 3}) heavy atom scintillator. We have investigated four dopant concentrations (0.01%, 1%, 10% and 50% mole fraction of CeF{sub 3}), measuring the emission spectrum, light output, and decay time distribution. The light output increases with increasing cerium concentration until a maximum of 2200 photons/MeV is reached at 10% CeF{sub 3}, then decreases to 1900 photons/MeV at 50% CeF{sub 3}. The emission spectrum depends on concentration, but consists of a pair of peaks centered at approximately 300 nm and 350 nm, with the lower cerium concentrations having a greater fraction of 300 nm emissions. The decay time distribution is well described by the sum of 3 exponential components: 3.0 ns, 26.5 ns, and a dopant dependent long component that varies between 185 ns and 275 ns. The fraction of the 3.0 ns fast component increases from 10% at 50% cerium to 15% at 1% cerium and the fraction of the long component increases from 3% at 50% cerium to 21% at 1% cerium. There is hope that a different cerium doping fraction or different host crystal would increase the intensity of these 3 ns emissions. 13 refs., 6 figs., 1 tab.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Lab., CA (USA)
• Sponsoring Organization: DOE/ER; DOHHS
• DOE Contract Number: AC03-76SF00098; AC03-82ER13000
• OSTI ID: 6733873
• Report Number(s): LBL-29248; CONF-900563--16; ON: DE90015466; CNN: P01 25840; R01 CA38086
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
360603* -- Materials-- Properties
CERIUM COMPOUNDS
CERIUM FLUORIDES
DOPED MATERIALS
EMISSION SPECTRA
FLUORIDES
FLUORINE COMPOUNDS
HALIDES
HALOGEN COMPOUNDS
LANTHANUM COMPOUNDS
LANTHANUM FLUORIDES
MATERIALS
RARE EARTH COMPOUNDS
SCINTILLATIONS
SPECTRA