International Topical Meeting on Nuclear Research Applications and Utilization of Accelerators
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SM/EN-11
Detection of Explosives and Other Illicit Materials by Nanosecond Neutron Analysis D.N. Vakhtin, A. Evsenin, O. Osetrov, P. Yurmanov, and A. Kuznetsov V.G. Khlopin Radium Institute, Saint-Petersburg, Russia, Russian Federation Corresponding Author: vakhtin@khlopin.ru Experimental results in the detection of explosive and other hazardous materials by Nanosecond Neutron Analysis (NNA) technique are presented. The detecting device SENNA is based on a portable DT neutron generator with built-in segmented detector of associated α-particles, up to 12 BGO-based detectors of γ-rays, and fast data collection electronics. The following detectionscenarios are explored: a) identification of liquids in sealed containers; The ability of the SENNA system to identify sealed liquids by their C/N/O ratio is demonstrated.Results of measurements with samples of liquids weighting from 40 g to 1 kg are discussed. The possibility of tuning SENNA’s decision-making algorithm to automatically determine the necessary measurement time is discussed. Examples of the dependence of the number of successful and unsuccessful detections of 200 g and 500 g samples on measurement time in a particular geometry are presented. The procedure of tuning the decision-making algorithm for the detection of small amounts of explosives concealed inside heavy luggage is described. Methods of handling the distorted measured values of concentrations of major chemical elements obtained due to presence of large masses of benign materials close to explosives are discussed. Current and planned research activities in the field of further NNA development are briefly presented. |
