An ongoing objective in the field of organic radiation detection materials is to achieve a balance between scintillation performance characteristics and cost. Organic molecular crystals possess superior light-yields and neutron/gamma pulse-shape discrimination (PSD), but are expensive to produce in large sizes. In contrast, liquid and plastic scintillators are readily scalable to large sizes, although both are characterized by reduced light yields and particle discrimination properties. For example, the brightest (non-PSD) plastic scintillators possess light yields of about 10,400 photons/MeVee, which is approximately 80% that of solution-grown trans-stilbene crystals. The light yields of PSD-capable plastics are about 8600 photons/MeVee, which is roughly 65% that of trans-stilbene crystals. Thus, there is a need for improved low-cost, large scintillators.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds