Design, fabrication, and properties of a continuous carbon-fiber reinforced Sm2O3/polyimide gamma ray/neutron shielding material

• Sm2O3 is used for neutron absorber instead of B4C, and Sm2O3 has a good photon-shielding effect.
• Carbon-fiber cloth and polyimide were used to enhance shielding materials’ mechanical behavior and thermal behavior.
• Both Monte Carlo method and shielding test were used to evaluate shielding performance of the novel shielding material.

The design and fabrication of shielding materials with good heat-resistance and mechanical properties is a major problem in the radiation shielding field. In this paper, based on gamma ray and neutron shielding theory, a continuous carbon-fiber reinforced Sm2O3/polyimide gamma ray/neutron shielding material was fabricated by hot-pressing method. The material's application behavior was subsequently evaluated using neutron shielding, photon shielding, mechanical tensile, and thermogravimetric analysis–differential scanning calorimetry tests. The results show that the tensile strength of the novel shielding material exceeds 200 MPa, which makes it of similar strength to aluminum alloy. The material does not undergo crosslinking and decomposition reactions at 300 °C and it can be used in such environments for long periods of time. The continuous carbon-fiber reinforced Sm2O3/polyimide material has a good shielding performance with respect to gamma rays and neutrons. The material thus has good prospects for use in fusion reactor system and nuclear waste disposal applications.