PROSPECTS FOR NEW INORGANIC SCINTILLATORS

Although scintillation has been discovered in many inorganic crystals during the past 40 years, there is continued interest in finding compounds with improved scintillation properties. However, the testing of candidate compounds has thus far been limited to those available as crystals of suitable quality and size. We describe a method using synchrotron x-radiation for measuring the fluorescence properties of powders, which makes accessible a much larger number of compounds. We present results for 85 compounds tested by this method. Scintillation from several compounds was discovered, notably CeF3 and PbCO3. Copyright © 1990 by The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.