Development of indigenous pulse-shape discrimination algorithm for organic scintillation detectors

Abstract

In this study, we present the development of an indigenous pulse shape discrimination (PSD) algorithm grounded in tail area and total area analysis, effectively obviating the necessity for specialized programmable hardware. Pulse data was collected utilizing a BC501 detector paired with a Pu-Be source and digitized in oscilloscope mode during experiments conducted at IIT-Kanpur. The algorithm developed in this work encompasses essential functions such as pulse normalization, shaping, peak identification and removal, and threshold determination. Notably, the algorithm offers the capability to derive neutron and γ-ray counts, generate scatter plots, and calculate the figure-of-Merit (FoM). It is essential to emphasize that the development of this indigenous Tail-to-Total Area (TtoT) PSD algorithm was a direct response to the unavailability of dedicated hardware for PSD in the experiment conducted at IIT-Kanpur. The introduction of the TtoT algorithm played a pivotal role in enabling offline PSD analysis at IIT-Kanpur, effectively overcoming infrastructure limitations. Importantly, the efficacy of our proposed algorithm was tested by applying it to pulse data from a distinct source-detector arrangement featuring a BC501A detector and an Cf-252 source. This comparative analysis also included the Charge Integration (CI) method and was conducted at IIT-Roorkee. The results obtained from our algorithm and the CI method exhibited a strong concurrence concerning the identification of neutrons and γ-rays, along with FoM metrics.