A CR-39 TRACK DOSIMETER FOR ROUTINE INDIVIDUAL NEUTRON MONITORING

A personal neutron dosemeter for routine individual monitoring is proposed. It is based on a CR-39 track detector covered on three separate areas by converters with different boron contents and inserted into a commercial TLD albedo dosemeter capsule. The dose readings from three areas of the electrochemically etched CR-39 detector are combined to yield a dose equivalent response which is almost independent of the incident neutron energy in the range from thermal neutrons up to 20 MeV. In addition, the dose contributions of thermal, intermediate and fast neutrons can be determined separately. Unlike the TLD albedo dosemeter, which in general requires prior in-field calibration and whose use is then restricted to that field, this dosemeter can be used in neutron fields without any knowledge of the spectral distribution with the same calibration factor. The angular dependence of the dosemeter's response has been measured and compared with that of the directional dose equivalent H'(10). The lower limit of detection is 0.15 mSv. It is possible to obtain an independent, second dose reading from the same CR-39 detector for neutron energies above 100 keV. The dosemeter has also been successfully tested for use in accident dosimetry applying chemical etching and an optical density reading of the CR-39 detector.