Interaction of gamma-rays, neutrons, and charged particles with matter by Octavian Sima

The course will have 6 lectures of 2 hours each. It will start in the week 19-23.02, and will be every Thursday, in the interval 13:00 - 15:00. 

Topic 1.

Interaction of radiation with matter

1. Interaction of heavy charged particles
   • Interaction mechanisms
   • Stopping Power, Bragg Curve, Range
   • Protons, a particles
   • Heavier Ions, Fission Fragments
2. Interaction of electrons
   • Interaction mechanisms
   • Stopping Power, Range, Straggling
3. Photon interactions
   • Interaction processes
   • Linear and mass attenuation coefficients
4. Neutron interaction
   • Interaction processes
   • Cross Sections
5. Data Bases and software

Topic 2.

Simulation of radiation transport

1. Principles of Monte Carlo simulation
2. Monte Carlo simulation of basic modules in radiation transport
3. Simple examples
4. Monte Carlo codes

Topic 3.

Radiation detection and measurement

1. Types of radiation detectors
2. Active detectors
   • Signals – analog and digital
   • Electronics
3. Passive detectors

Topic 4.

Gamma-ray spectrometry

1. Detection processes
   • Scintillation detectors
   • Semiconductor detectors
2. High Resolution gamma-ray spectrometry
   • Spectrum parameters – calibration
   • Spectrum dependence on photon energy
   • Peak and Full Energy Peak Efficiency
     • Ge X-ray escape, coincidence summing, pile-up
3. Application: activity assessment 
4. Application: nuclear spectroscopy
   • Construction of the level scheme
   • Spin and parity assessment – angular distributions and correlations
   • Magnetic dipole moment, quadrupole electric moment – perturbed angular correlations, resonance methods
   • Transition probabilities
   • Evaluated Nuclear Data bases

Topic 5.

Neutron Detection

1. Detection of thermal neutrons

• Materials for active detectors (³He, ¹⁰B, ⁶Li, ¹⁵⁷Gd)
• Examples of thermal neutron detectors; n-g discrimination
• Self-powered detectors
• Activation detectors

1. Detection of epithermal and high energy neutrons
   • Detectors based on neutron moderation
   • Detectors based on nuclear recoil
   • Neutron spectrometry – Bonner spheres, proton recoil spectrometers, time of flight

Topic 6.

Dosimetric instruments

1. Principles of Radioprotection and Dosimetry
2. Passive dosimeters TLD, OSL, track detectors
3. Active dosimeters TEPC, solid state dosimeters

Practical work

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Gamma-ray spectrometry