Impact of TiO2 on radiation shielding competencies and structural, physical and optical properties of CeO2–PbO–B2O3 glasses

Highlights: • Successful fabrication of borate glasses through replacement of B₂O₃ by TiO₂. • These glasses may have applications as optical filter devices because of their full band UV Blocking tendency. • T5 glass was found to be best shielder for fast, thermal neutron and gamma rays. -- Abstract: The glasses of series xTiO₂-xCeO₂-(30-x) PbO-(70-x) B₂O₃ where 2 ≤x ≤ 10 mol% were made using conventional melt-quench method and X-ray diffraction technique has been used to ascertain the amorphous nature of these glasses. The analysis of the compositional dependence of the physical parameters like density, molar volume and oxygen packing density along with the elastic parameters (Young's modulus, shear modulus, Vickers hardness number) of the studied glasses has been done. Infrared (IR) spectra revealed BO₃ and BO₄ units as main glass forming groups in these glasses but at higher concentrations of TiO₂, Ti³⁺ and Ti⁴⁺ ions get significantly incorporated in glass matrix thereby creating TiO₄ and TiO₆ structural units. Optical spectral studies indicated that the band gap energy values decreased with increasing TiO₂ content and these glasses had good UV-blocking efficiency which could be exploited for their use as transparent UV shielding materials. The radiation shielding parameters such as Half Value Layer, Linear Attenuation Coefficient, Exposure Buildup Factor, Mean Free Path including thermal and fast neutron cross section were deduced which indicated that the attenuation performance of these glasses improved with the addition of TiO₂. Lower values of Exposure Buildup Factor and higher values of thermal and fast neutron removal cross section reflect the proficient shielding ability of these glasses.