Enhancement of Borosilicate Glass's Radiation Shielding Properties: Impacts of PbO Substitution for SiO2

The objective of this study is to prepare SiO2-B2O3-Na2O-PbO glass systems and to study the radiation shielding properties of the prepared glasses. The Monte Carlo simulation (MCNP5 code) was used to simulate the mass attenuation coefficient for the prepared glasses. The results demonstrated a positive relationship between the PbO content and the density of the glasses. The density of the prepared glasses varied between 2.823 and 4.199 g/cm(3) for the glasses with 5 and 25 mo% of PbO. The linear attenuation coefficient (LAC) of the prepared glasses were obtained using both MCNP-5 and XCOM, and the difference between the LAC values always remains less than +/- 2.1%, with the highest difference occurring at 1.173 MeV. The half value layer (HVL) of the glasses was determined and the results showed that the glass with the highest PbO content has the lowest HVL at all energies. The lead equivalent thickness (Delta(eq)) results demonstrated that the glass with 25 mol% of PbO has the most desirable shielding properties, due to the smaller thickness needed to have a comparable shielding ability to pure lead. The transmission factor (TF) for glasses with thickness of 1 cm is determined and the TF values at all energies follow the order of SBNP-5 > SBNP-10 > SBNP-15 > SBNP-20 > SBNP-25.