Modernization of the pulse shape discrimination method for neutron and gamma quanta in scintillation detector

In this paper, we investigated the efficiency of several known and new methods of digital pulse shape discrimination for neutrons and gamma quanta. Experimental data were obtained on a setup consists of a Pu-Be neutron source, organic p-terphenyl scintillation detector and 14 bits, 500 MHz sampling rate flash-ADC with capability to store and upload to the host computer long waveforms for further analysis. A comparison is made in between the results of using traditional and new methods for calculating the signal separation efficiency of Figure of Merit (FOM). The best known from the literature value of the efficiency of neutron and gamma quanta discrimination for the Pu-Be source is FOM = 1.5. We obtained the separation efficiency FOM = 1.77 in the scintillation detector with the p-terphenyl crystal, by a new method. Note also that for the known liquid scintillator BC-501A FOM≈1. A new method of scintillation detector pulse shape discrimination from neutrons and gamma quanta is used to detect the neutron yield from compact neutron generator that is created on the basis of carbon nanotubes.