CeO2 Nanowires Aqueous γ-Radiation Dosimeter for Low Dose Sensitively Detecting

In radiation accident, detecting the accurate radiation rapidly is very important for rescuing wounded persons and dealing with the emergency. In the past decades, aqueous chemical dosimeter was widely used in the dose monitoring of radiation. However, each chemical dosimeter has a dose detection limit, for example, ×107 Gy for Frick dosimeter and 1000 Gy for FBX (ferrous sulphate- benzoic acid-xylenol orange) one. Those chemical dosimeters are not suitable for monitoring of dose less than 1000 Gy. In this work, CeO2 nanowires were synthesized by a hydrothermal method for developing a new low dose aqueous -radiation dosimeter. The researching results showed that the aqueous CeO2 nanowire dosimeter exhibited high sensitivity to -radiation of less than 1000 Gy dose and a good linear response in dose range from 20 Gy to 500 Gy. The radiation response mechanism of the CeO2 nanowires aqueous - radiation dosimeter is given as well. Furthermore, the effect of the initial CeO2 concentration on absorption varying rate of the CeO2 nanowires aqueous -radiation dosimeter was also investigated. The results indicated that absorption varying rate increased with the CeO2 concentration decreasing. In a lower concentration of 0.05 mg/ml, the relative absorption variation rate of CeO2 nanowires aqueous reached more than 83% under 28 Gy. A radical scavenger (ethanol) was added in the CeO2 nanowires aqueous to researching impact of radicals on the reaction of the CeO2 nanowires with -ray. There was almost no change of the absorption observed after ethanol adding, indicating the radicals produced from water radiolysis were closely relevant to the reaction of the CeO2 nanowires with -ray. The CeO2 nanowires dosimeter may be used as a highly sensitive, cost-effective dosimeter in ultra-low dose environment, which can help fireman detecting the radiation rapidly in radiation accident emergency rescue.