Title: Retrospective Imaging and Characterization of Nuclear Material

Abstract

Modern techniques for detection of covert nuclear ma-terial requires some combination of real time measurement and/or sampling of the material. More common is real time measure-ment of the ionizing emission caused by radioactive decay or through the materials measured in response to external interroga-tion radiation. One can expose the suspect material with various radiation types, including high energy photons such as x rays or with larger particles such as neutrons and muons, to obtain images or measure nuclear reactions induced in the material. Stand-off detection using imaging modalities similar to those in the medical field can be accomplished, or simple collimated detec-tors can be used to localize radioactive materials. In all such cases, the common feature is that some or all of the nuclear materials have to be present for the measurement, which makes sense; as one might ask, “How you can measure something that is not there?” The current work and results show how to do exactly that: characterize nuclear materials after they have been removed from an area leaving no chemical trace. This new approach is demon-strated to be fully capable of providing both previous source spa-tial distribution and emission energy grouping. The technique uses magnetic resonance formore » organic insulators and/or lumines-cence techniques on ubiquitous refractory materials similar in theory to the way the nuclear industry carries out worker person-nel dosimetry. Spatial information is obtained by acquiring gridded samples for dosimetric measurements, while energy infor-mation comes through dose depth profile results that are func-tions of the incident radiation energies.« less

Authors:

Hayes, Robert B. ^[1]; Sholom, Sergey ^[2]

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+ Show Author Affiliations

1. North Carolina State Univ., Raleigh, NC (United States)
2. Oklahoma State Univ., Stillwater, OK (United States)

Publication Date:

Tue Aug 01 00:00:00 EDT 2017

Research Org.:

North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC (United States)

Sponsoring Org.:

USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), Office of Nonproliferation and Verification Research and Development (NA-22)

OSTI Identifier:

1438211

Grant/Contract Number:  

NA0002576

Resource Type:

Accepted Manuscript

Journal Name:

Health Physics

Additional Journal Information:

Journal Volume: 113; Journal Issue: 2; Journal ID: ISSN 0017-9078

Publisher:

Health Physics Society

Country of Publication:

United States

Language:

English

Subject:

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY