Common approach to study scintillators response to gamma-rays and protons

This publication reports on the methods for measuring the scintillators relative light yield from gamma-rays and protons or heavier ions. The results are presented as a function of velocity of primary ionizing particle in order to investigate quenching of scintillation light in wide range of ionization densities. Measured velocity is also transformed into electron equivalent energy, in order to show that this approach allows for extrapolation of non-proportionality characteristics below low light threshold limits encountered in experiments performed with γ-rays, X-rays and electrons. The experiments were performed with EJ301 liquid scintillator and thallium doped CsI. In the case of EJ301 the response to γ-rays was measured using Compton scattered γ-rays, whereas proton response was registered via fast neutron elastic scattering. In the case of CsI:Tl the response to γ-rays was measured using full energy peak detection, whereas proton and deuteron response was registered by means of the van de Graaff accelerator and the C-30 cyclotron.