Towards effective indirect radioisotope energy converters with bright and radiation hard scintillators of (Gd,Y)3Al2Ga3O12 family

Ceramics of quaternary garnets (Gd,Y)3Al2Ga3O12 doped with Ce, Tb have been fabricated and evaluated as prospective materials for indirect energy converters of a-and b-voltaic. Samples were characterized at excitation with an X-ray source and an intense 150 keV electron beam and showed good temperature stability of their emission and tolerance to irradiation. The role of X-rays accompanied the a-particle emitting in the increase of the conversion efficiency is clarified. The garnet-type structure of the matrix in the developed materials allows the production of quality crystalline mass with a light yield exceeding that of the commonly used YAG: Ce scintillator by a factor of two times. ?? 2022 Korean Nuclear Society, Published by Elsevier Korea LLC. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Automated summary

Ceramics of quaternary garnets doped with Ce, Tb have been fabricated and evaluated as prospective materials for indirect energy converters. The samples showed good temperature stability and tolerance to irradiation, and the role of X-rays in increasing the conversion efficiency has been clarified.