Manufacturing polycrystalline pellets of natural quartz for applications in thermoluminescence dosimetry

• Autor(a) principal: Carvalho Junior,Álvaro Barbosa de
• Data de Publicação: 2012
• Outros Autores: Barros,Thiago Fernandes, Guzzo,Pedro Luiz, Khoury,Helen Jamil
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Materials research (São Carlos. Online)
• Texto Completo: http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1516-14392012000400009
• topic: quartz; cold-pressed pellets; thermoluminescence; radiation dosimetry

This paper describes the manufacturing process of quartz-pellets and shows their potential use as thermoluminescence dosimeters (TLD) for those applications where low-levels of ionising radiation are present. Two batches of cold-pressed pellets were produced and their resistance were evaluated by vibration tests and weight-loss measurements. The batch manufactured with 75 × 150 µm particles showed enough resistance to be employed as TLD. The dosimetric properties of the 310 °C peak appearing in the glow curves of these pellets were characterized together with commercial TLD-100 units using γ- and X-ray beams with different energies. The uncertainties related to reproducibility and stability of the TL signal were better than 10%. The sensitivity and the linearity of the TL response of quartz-pellets were better than that measured for TLD-100 for doses ranging from 0.5 to 200 mGy. The energy dependence of the quartz-pellets was higher than that of TLD-100 but it cannot be considered a restriction to their use in clinical procedures and industrial applications.