Temperature dependence of ionization quenching in BGO scintillators

Abstract

Scintillation detectors are commonly used as radiation detectors. For the detection of heavy ions a non-linearity in scintillation light output is observed which is known as ionization quenching. In this paper we investigate whether the ionization quenching for BGO scintillators depends on temperature. This would impact the validity of ionization quenching correction models in temperature unstable environments. We measured temperature dependent light output curves for several ion species at different energies at the Heavy Ion Medical Accelerator in Chiba (HIMAC), Japan. We find that the normalized temperature dependent light output curves show the same temperature dependence for all ion species and energies. Therefore, we conclude that the effect of ionization quenching in BGO is independent of temperature. Thus the temperature dependence of scintillation light output and the effect of ionization quenching are independent and can be separately correct by the already developed models for the scintillation light output of BGO.