The light-yield response of a NE-213 liquid-scintillator detector measured using 2 -- 6 MeV tagged neutrons

TL;DR

This study measures the light-yield response of a NE-213 liquid scintillator to 2-6 MeV tagged neutrons, analyzing pulse components and comparing results with simulations and existing models.

Contribution

It provides detailed measurements of neutron response in NE-213, including pulse-shape analysis and evaluation of different light-yield parametrizations, validated against existing data.

Findings

Results agree with existing data and models

Sensitivity to pulse portion and length affects light yield

Different prescriptions for energy transfer edges were compared

Abstract

The response of a NE-213 liquid-scintillator detector has been measured using tagged neutrons from 2--6 MeV originating from an Am/Be neutron source. The neutron energies were determined using the time-of-flight technique. Pulse-shape discrimination was employed to discern between gamma-rays and neutrons. The behavior of both the fast (35 ns) and the combined fast and slow (475 ns) components of the neutron scintillation-light pulses were studied. Three different prescriptions were used to relate the neutron maximum energy-transfer edges to the corresponding recoil-proton scintillation-light yields, and the results were compared to simulations. Parametrizations which predict the fast or total light yield of the scintillation pulses were also tested. Our results agree with both existing data and existing parametrizations. We observe a clear sensitivity to the portion and length of the neutron scintillation-light pulse considered.