Development of the ferric oxide-based polyester composites for radiation protection applications: an extensive experimental analysis for its fabrication, characterization, and gamma-ray shielding properties

The present work novelty is to develop a new γ-ray shielding material based on the cheap coating polyester sealer reinforced by ferric oxide. The morphology of the newly fabricated polyester-based composites as well as the elemental chemical composition were investigated utilizing the scanning electron microscope and energy-Dispersive X-ray spectrometer. Furthermore, the γ-ray shielding properties were simulated utilizing the Monte Carlo simulation and the results were affirmed using the experimental measurements. The obtained data depicts that the substitution of 50 wt% polyester by Fe 2 O 3 compounds enhances the linear attenuation coefficient from 0.218 cm −1 to 0.553 cm −1 (at 0.059 MeV), from 0.091 cm −1 to 0.108 cm −1 (at 0.662 MeV), and from 0.067 cm −1 to 0.079 cm −1 (at 1.252 MeV). The enhancement in the linear attenuation coefficient values enhances the radiation protection efficiency accompanied by a reduction in the half-value thickness and the transmission factor of the fabricated composites.