The feasibility of boron containing phosphors in thermal neutron image plates, in particular the systems M2B5O9X : Eu2+ (M=Ca, Sr, Ba; X=Cl, Br) Part II: experimental results

The storage phosphor properties of the compounds M2B5O9X : Eu2+ (M=Ca, Sr, Ba; X=Cl, Br) have been studied. The best compounds, Sr2B5O9Br : Eu2+ and Ca2B5O9Br : Eu2+, show a photostimulated luminescence yield of, respectively, 21 and 14 photons per incident thermal neutron. They contain natural boron. With these yields, image plates with detective quantum efficiency values of more than 40% are envisaged when using enriched 10B, but the stimulation energy at 633 nm is too high