Experimental study of yttrium-based ceramic systems containing nanomaterials for gamma radiation protecting applications

This study reports the structure and the radiation shielding performances of yttrium-based oxide ceramic (YBCO) superconductor added with different nanomaterials including barium titanate nanoparticles (BaTiO${}_3$), titanium oxide (TiO${}_2$) nanotubes, and carbon nanotubes (CNTs). The samples are coded as follows: Sample 1 (pristine YBCO sample), Sample 2 (YBCO co-added with TiO${}_2$ and CNTs) and Sample 3 (YBCO co-added with BaTiO${}_3$ and CNTs). The crystal structure was examined using the XRD technique. The crystallite size D${}_{W-H}$, as well as the lattice strain L${}_s$, were calculated using Williamson and Hall (W-H) approach. D${}_{W-H}$ was found to decrease from 93.67 nm for sample 1 to 61.87 nm and 53.30 nm for samples 2 and 3, respectively. The linear attenuation coefficient (LAC) was measured. The LAC values at 0.122 MeV are equal to 4.959 cm${}^{-1}$, 5.020 cm${}^{-1}$, and 5.482 cm${}^{-1}$ for Sample1, Sample 2, and Sample 3, respectively. At all tested energies, Sample 1 has a lower LAC compared to Sample 2 and Sample 3, which suggests that the used co-additives improve the radiation shielding properties of the YBCO ceramic. From the attenuation value layers, we found that the Sample 3 ceramic composite has a better attenuation performance than Samples 1 and 2, and the half-value layers at 0.356 MeV are equal to 0.904, 0.833 and 0.765 cm for Samples 1, 2 and 3, respectively.