Radiation shielding characteristics of HDPE/tungsten oxide nanocomposites reinforced with graphene oxide and LDPE using Geant4, XCOM and experiment

This research aims to determine and quantify the radiation shielding characteristics of High Density Polyethylene/Tungsten Oxide composite (HDPE/WO3) including the linear attenuation coefficient (µ), mass attenuation coefficient (µ/ρ), half-value layer (HVL) and tenth-value layer (TVL) for photons at various energies using Geant4, XCOM, and experiment. Thus, HDPE was chosen as the polymer matrix. Then, the samples at various concentrations of WO3 nanoparticles, including 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 9.5 wt%, different graphene oxide (GO) wt% namely 0, 0.25, 0.5, and 1 wt%, and linear low-density polyethylene (LLDPE) at 10, and 20 wt% were fabricated. NaI (Tl) scintillation detector was used to measure the shielding quantities using the 201Tl, and 99mTc sources at three energies of 135, 140, and 167 keV. The experimental results demonstrated that the addition of GO and LLDPE to the HDPE matrix resulted in a more uniform samples. Incorporating 20% LLDPE into the HDPE polymer matrix for the 99mTc resulted in an 18% rise in µ compared to pure HDPE. Finally, experimental results revealed a comparatively good agreement with the Geant4 and XCOM simulations.