Experimental study of structural, mechanical, and nuclear properties of neutron absorber composites containing boron

The present study investigated the structural, mechanical, and nuclear properties of two types of polymeric and metallic composites containing boron carbide particles. The neutron transmission test obtained lower neutron transmission in BPAER reinforced with B4C nanoparticles compared to the microparticle-reinforced composite. The stress-strain diagrams obtained from the tensile test show the improvement of the mechanical properties of the epoxy resin composite reinforced with B4C nanoparticles compared to the microparticles. The neutron transmission test also indicates an improvement in the nuclear properties of the Al-B4C nanocomposite compared to the Al-B4C micro composite. On the other hand, the density of this nanocomposite shows an increase compared to the micro composite. Also, regardless of the size and amount of carbide particles added, the density of all composite samples was lower than that of aluminum. Also, the hardness of the composite increased with increasing the amount of reinforcing phase, which was more in the nanocomposite samples than in the micro composite samples.