Evaluations of pure and ytterbium doped transparent ceramic complex perovskite scintillators

Optical and scintillation properties of complex perovskite transparent ceramic scintillators of pure and Yb3+ doped Ba(ZrMgTa)O3 and (LaSr)(AlTa)O3 ceramics are reported. The materials were produced by Murata Manufacturing. Their optical properties including transmittance and photoluminescence spectra were evaluated. The ceramics demonstrated high transparency (50–70%) in visible wavelength region. Additionally, strong emission peaks were observed at 470 nm in Ba(ZrMgTa)O3 under 284 nm excitation and at 500 nm in (LaSr)(AlTa)O3 under 324 nm excitation. The photoluminescence decay times of Ba(ZrMgTa)O3 and (LaSr)(AlTa)O3 samples were 14 and 16 μs, respectively. Judging from these optical properties, Yb3+ emission was not observed in these materials. In radio luminescence spectra, all specimens exhibited the same emission peaks with relatively higher emission intensity. 241Am 5.5 MeV α-ray induced pulse height spectra of the samples were also measured, and (LaSr)(AlTa)O3 demonstrated ∼500 ph/5.5 MeV α with 10 μs shaping time constant.

► Studies about transparent ceramic perovskite materials are very rare. ► In this work, we investigate scintillation properties of transparent ceramic complex perovskite materials, such as (LaSr)(AlTa)O3 and Ba(ZrMgTa)O3 first. ► This is the first step to search new ceramic scintillation material systems.