Investigation of gamma ray, electron, and neutron interaction parameters of some topological insulating materials

Abstract

The gamma ray, neutron, and electron radiation interaction parameters were calculated for some topological insulating (TI) materials such as Sb2Te3, Bi2Se3, Bi2Te2Se and Bi2Te3 at various energies. The gamma ray interaction parameters such as mass attenuation coefficient, half value layer, tenth value layer, effective atomic number, equivalent atomic number, exposure buildup factor, and energy absorption buildup factor were calculated in the energy range of 0.015–15 MeV at penetration depths of 1–40 mfp by using the five-parameter Geometric Progression (G-P) fitting approximation method. The buildup factors were found to be dependent on the energy of the incident photon, penetration depth, and material elemental composition, and they were also found to be higher for Sb2Te3 than for other TI materials throughout the energy region of investigation. The neutron interaction parameters, such as fast neutron removal cross section, were calculated for the selected topological insulator materials using Phy-X/PSD software and found to be higher for Bi2Te3 than for the other three materials. The electron stopping power values were calculated for the selected topological insulator materials in the energy range of 0.01 MeV to 1000 MeV using the ESTAR program. It was found that the stopping power values decreased slowly with increasing electron energy in the lower energy region, remained almost constant in the medium energy region, and increased rapidly in the higher energy region.