Characterization of aluminum and boron carbide based additive manufactured material for thermal neutron shielding

We characterize the suitability of two additive manufactured materials for use in shielding thermal neutrons for neutron scattering instrumentation. We compare two different boron based additive manufactured masks to a traditionally manufactured boron nitride mask in a real-use case scenario. The fi...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: M.B. Stone, A.I. Kolesnikov, V.R. Fanelli, A.F. May, Shuang Bai, J. Liu
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2024-01-01
Series:Materials & Design
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S026412752300878X
Description
Summary:We characterize the suitability of two additive manufactured materials for use in shielding thermal neutrons for neutron scattering instrumentation. We compare two different boron based additive manufactured masks to a traditionally manufactured boron nitride mask in a real-use case scenario. The first additive manufactured mask is a composite of aluminum and boron carbide. The second additive manufactured mask is a composite of boron carbide and cyanoacrylate. We report the thermal conductivity of the aluminum boron carbide mask in comparison to other relevant materials. The aluminum boron carbide material may find use in shielding applications where thermal conductivity, a low total neutron scattering cross section, and low toxicity are criteria.
ISSN:0264-1275