Highly transparent glass of barium-reinforced borotellurite as a protective material from gamma rays

A series of barium borotellurite glass networks (BT-Ba) were produced to study their effectiveness in attenuating gamma rays at different energies and fast neutrons. A host borotellurite glass network of the composition 25TeO 2 -25B 2 O 3 -10CaO-10ZnO-30Na 2 O (BT) was proposed and reinforced with 10, 20, and 30 mol% of BaO (BTBa1, BTBa2, and BTBa3) at the expense of Na 2 O. The proposed BT-Ba glasses were produced using the melting/annealing method. The structural properties of the studied BT-Ba glass network were examined using X-ray diffraction (XRD), density and density-based parameters, and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra. These studies revealed the ability of BaO to enhance the amorphous phase of the studied borotellurite glass network and enrich it with non-bridging oxygen units (NBOs) through the conversion of the bridging ones (BOs). The visible light transparency of the produced BT-Ba glass series was examined by recording the optical transmittance spectra in the UV–visible light regions. Using EpiXS software, the gamma ray attenuation ability of the studied BT-Ba glasses was examined at different gamma ray energies of 302.851, 383.849, 661.657, 1173.228, 1332.492, 1408.013, and 1528.1 keV. While the fast neutron removal cross section was estimated according to the standard mixture rule. The dependence of the behavior of the mass and linear attenuation coefficients, half-value layer, effective atomic number, and effective electron density on BaO concentrations was extensively investigated to explore the attenuation ability of the studied glasses. Among the studied glasses, BT, BTBa1, BTBa2, and BTBa3, the fabricated glass BTBa3 had high transparency (more than 82%) and reduced the required half-value layer from 1.552 to 3.688 cm of BT to 1.041–2.965 cm for the studied gamma ray energies. On the other hand, a slight improvement in fast neutron attenuation with increasing BaO concentrations was observed. The BTBa3 glass had the highest fast neutron cross-section of 0.104 cm −1 . Hence, the BTBa3 glass is considered effective as a protective glass for gamma rays and fast neutrons, opening horizons for it in nuclear applications.