Radiation shielding and physical properties of lead borate glass-doped ZrO2 nanoparticles

Abstract

Zirconium oxide (ZrO2) nanoparticles have been prepared and examined by XRD. The transparent lead alkali borate glass systems of formula xZrO2–20PbO2–(80 − x)·Na2B4O7 (0 ≤ x ≤ 24 mol%) are prepared by melting quench method and doped by zirconia nanoparticles. Deconvolution of its FTIR reveals to increase the N4 fraction boron atoms. This result reveals the Zr4+ which forms BO4 network units. The density and refractive index of chosen glass are increased due to add of ZrO2 nanoparticles. Both ultrasonic velocities (longitudinal vL and shear vT) increase with the ZrO2 content increase. The packing density, bulk modulus and Young’s modulus increase with increasing of ZrO2 nanoparticle content. The attenuation coefficients of the studied glasses have been measured at different energies (356, 662, 1173 and 1332 keV) using narrow beam transmission geometry. The obtained results indicated that, the values of the mass attenuation coefficient (µm), the effective atomic number (Zeff) and effective electron density (Nel) of the glass samples decreased with the increase in the ZrO2 concentration at the energies (662,1173and 1332 keV), while these parameters (µm, Zeff and Nel) increased with the increase in the ZrO2 concentration at 356 keV. The samples are irradiated 30 min by argon glow discharge plasma (GDP). The values of optical band gap decreased slowly with ZrO2 nanoparticles increased and after plasma irradiation.