Development and characterization of scintillation based detectors for the use in radiological early warning networks

Abstract

To detect radiological incidents, all members of the European Union have installed nationwide radiological early warning networks. Most of the installed detector systems supply only dosimetric information. Novel spectrometry systems are considered to be good candidates for a new detector generation for environmental radiation monitoring because they will supply both nuclide-specific information and ambient dose equivalent rate values. Four different detector types were chosen and compared with each other (LaBr3, CeBr3, SrI2 scintillation detectors, and CdZnTe, a semiconductor detector). As a first step, the inherent background of these detectors was measured in the low background underground laboratory UDO II of PTB. As a second step, the relative detection sensitivity between the various detectors was determined at different energies. Finally, the detectors were exposed to a 4π-radiation field of radon progeny in PTB's radon chamber. The obtained results show that the investigated detectors are well suited for environmental radiation monitoring.