A simulation of neutron interaction from Am–Be source with the CR-39 detector

Abstract

Abstract Presented in this paper is a simulation of the interaction of neutrons emitted from a cylindrical Am–Be source with a CR-39 detector. A Fortran90 program, called Neutron.f90, has been written to determine the specifications of secondary particles (alpha particle or proton) and the kinematics of the interactions. A Monte Carlo method was used to simulate which interactions occurred with the constituents of the CR-39 detector, H, C and O atoms. Due to the detector composition, elastic and nonelastic scattering of neutrons is possible. In this paper, nonelastic scattering includes: inelastic scattering; the emission of an alpha particle (n,α) reaction and the emission of a proton (n,p) reaction. Cross sections of other reactions are very small and negligible in comparison with the above mentioned. The energy deposited per unit mass per one neutron was calculated. In addition the contribution to the energy deposited by the alpha particles and protons were determined separately. The program Neutron.f90 computes the coordinates of points in which interactions occur i.e. where secondary particles appear. The energy and angular distributions of protons are also represented in this paper. Another Fortran90 program, called Track_Visibility.f90, was written to calculate the number of visible proton tracks and to calculate the energy deposited per one neutron per one visible track.