Bent-Crystal Spectrometer Analyzing Plutonium K X-Rays for Applications in Nuclear Forensics

Center for Nuclear Security Science and Policy Initiatives

Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station

Bent-Crystal Spectrometer Analyzing Plutonium K X-Rays for Applications in Nuclear Forensics

 

Abstract:

The ability to quickly quantify the Pu content within spent nuclear fuel (SNF) is essential to nuclear forensics. Analysis of the Pu PuU to U UPu ratio can provide information on fuel and reactor history, including age, burnup and reactor typewhich could contribute to the attribution of a fuel sample. Plutonium concentration data can be acquired through non-destructive analysis (NDA) by detecting self-induced x-ray fluorescence (XRF) from Pu in the fuel. However, during conventional spectroscopy, the characteristic Pu x-ray peak of interest lies beneath background and requires an extended count time. Crystal spectrometers allow x-rays of selected energies, obeying Bragg’s law for coherent scattering of incident photons, to be focused directly onto a detector. This provides a high signal with limited background by decreasing the possible Compton interaction in the detector. The crystal design and the experimental geometry that would allow for the study of high energy x-rays required further attention. In addition, a preliminary MCNP simulation of the energy-direction coupled photon source from the quartz crystal was used to calculate the improved signal-to-noise ratio of the Pu x-ray peak above background.

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Associated Publications:

  1. A. Goodsell, "Flat Quartz-Crystal X-ray Spectrometer for Nuclear Forensics Applications", M.S. Thesis, Nuclear Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX (2012).

  2. A. Goodsell and W.S. Charlton, "Optimization of a Quartz-Crystal Spectrometer Design for Analyzing K X-rays from Pu and U", 53rd Annual Meeting of the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management, Orlando, Florida, 15-19 July 2012.

  3. A.V. Goodsell, W.S. Charlton, "Quartz-Crystal Spectrometer for the Analysis of Plutonium K X-Rays", GLOBAL 2011, Makuhar, Japan, December 11-16, 2011.

  4. A.V. Goodsell, W.S. Charlton. , "Bent-Crystal Spectrometer Analyzing Plutonium K X-Rays for Applications in Nuclear Forensics", 52nd Annual Meeting of the Institute for Nuclear Materials Management (INMM), Palm Desert, CA, July 17-21, 2011.