Conference comments by the Editors

The international community of researchers on fundamentals, development, and applications of inorganic scintillator materials has found the biennial meetings of the SCINT series to be an excellent chance to exchange data and ideas. These can range from very basic physical concepts and atomistic mechanisms in the materials under study up to truly application-minded tasks and problems defined by the modern needs for radiation detection, imaging, and spectroscopy of many kinds. The 12th International Conference on Inorganic Scintillators and their Applications (SCINT 2013) was organized by the Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, in Shanghai, April 15-19, 2013. There were in total 180 scientific contributions, 85 oral presentations, 17 invited talks, and 95 poster exhibitions presented by 147 participants from 18 different countries. This special issue of the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE comprises the selected and refereed original works based on the SCINT 2013 presentations, altogether 51 papers. The conference was technically and financially co-sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Nuclear and Plasma Sciences Society (IEEE). The SCINT 2013 conference organizers acknowledge with deep thanks also the sponsorship and support of seven domestic and foreign industrial companies participating in the conference exhibition.