Investigation of mechanical and radiation shielding features of heavy metal oxide based phosphate glasses for gamma radiation attenuation applications

In this study, xPbO₂ − [(100 − x)(0.5Na₂O − 0.5P₂O₅)] glass samples where x = 0, 5, 10, 15, 20 and 30 mol%, were prepared and their radiation shielding and mechanical properties were investigated. A 3 × 3 inch NaI (Tl) scintillation detector has been used to detect the emitted gamma-ray. The obtained results revealed the increase of both PbO₂ content and the photon energy from 0.356 to 1.33 MeV increase the mass attenuation coefficient (MAC), the effective atomic number (EAN), and the radiation protection efficiency (RPE) and in the same time decrease the values of the half-value layer (HVL) and the mean free path (MFP). The G-P fitting method was used to calculate the exposure buildup factor in the photon energy range of 0.015–15 MeV along with the use of SRIM code, ESTAR database and the removal cross-sections to calculate the proton, alpha and electron mass stopping power of the prepared glasses. These parameters are affected mainly with Zⁿ (n = 2 or 4). Moreover, the elastic properties of the glass samples have been calculated by measuring both longitudinal (VL) and shear (VS) velocities using the pulse-echo overlap technique at 5 MHz. The sample that had 30 PbO₂ mol% had the highest elastic properties that gives confidence in the possibility of using these glasses for radiation shielding application.