Effects of Gadolinium in Fe based amorphous ribbons with high boron contents on the neutron shielding efficiency

Fe based amorphous alloys with high boron and gadolinium contents have been developed through a systematic alloy design technique for neutron shielding applications. Amorphous ribbons with the Gd content up to 10 at.% were prepared by a melt-spinning method and used as reinforcements within polyester matrix and concrete matrix, respectively. Excellent neutron shielding efficiency about 75% was obtained from the polyester hexahedron composites (5 cm × 5 cm × 1 cm) including only 1 vol% ribbon with the composition of Fe72B15Mo3Gd10. Moreover, a concrete composite (φ 10 cm × 5 cm thick) in which the amorphous ribbons with the composition of Fe72B24.5Mo3Gd0.5 were uniformly distributed exhibited neutron shielding efficiency of around 86% demonstrating the applicability of amorphous ribbons as reinforcements in various composites for neutron shielding facility constructions.