Original title: Performance and prospects of polyurethane-based scintillators for neutron and gamma radiation detection
Olga Maiatska, Torsten Duennebacke, Roland Hillebrands, Achim Kreuels +5 · August 2026
Detecting gamma rays and fast neutrons usually requires organic scintillators. These are materials that flash with light when radiation hits them. For decades, it has been hard to make one material that is stable, rugged, produces bright light flashes, and can tell the two radiation types apart. To solve this, researchers mixed light-emitting chemicals, called phosphors and wavelength shifters, inside polyurethane, a tough plastic used in construction. When radiation strikes the plastic, these added chemicals create light signals that distinguish neutrons from gamma rays. The resulting material successfully combines toughness with clear detection. Making it is simpler than producing traditional plastics, and builders can cast electronics directly inside it. This allows compact radiation monitors for imaging and personal safety.
You are trying to tell whether a package contains glass or metal by tapping it. You cannot open it, but the sound of the tap reveals the contents. Here, the researchers built a detector out of a tough plastic that, when hit by radiation, produces a flash whose shape reveals whether it was a neutron or a gamma ray. The polyurethane is the package, and the pulse shape is the sound.
Neutron and gamma detectors are often bulky, fragile, or expensive. Polyurethane-based scintillators can be cheap, tough, and molded into any shape. This makes portable dual-detection accessible for border security, nuclear decommissioning, and medical imaging.
The abstract does not report specific light yield or PSD figure-of-merit numbers. It does not quantitatively compare performance against commercial scintillators. Long-term stability and radiation hardness are not addressed. Applications are described only at a preliminary stage.
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Performance and prospects of polyurethane-based scintillators for neutron and gamma radiation detection — Olga Maiatska, Torsten Duennebacke, Roland Hillebrands et al.
Abstract licence: CC0
Explanation generated by Synthesis from the abstract — it is not the original paper. This is a preprint, so it hasn't necessarily been peer reviewed.