LAUSR

Abstract In this paper, we studied the gamma photon attenuation properties for different germanate glasses systems with composition Sb2O3–GeO2–SiO2–Al2O3, TeO2–WO3–GeO2, GeO2–TeO2/SiO2–PbO–CaO–Tm2O3 and B2O3–GeO2–Gd2O3–Eu2O3–GdF3–BaF2. The mass attenuation coefficients (μ/ρ) for the selected germanate glasses were calculated at different energies (between 0.015 MeV and 15 MeV) using the MCNPX code. The calculated MCNPX μ/ρ values then compared with the WinXCom data to check the accuracy in the results. The results showed that the Sb2O3 replacement by SiO2 causes a decrease in μ/ρ for Sb2O3–GeO2–SiO2–Al2O3 glass system. Also, it is found that for TeO2–WO3–GeO2 glass system, μ/ρ decreases as GeO2 content increases from 1 to 20 mol%. While for GeO2–TeO2/SiO2–PbO–CaO–Tm2O3 glass system, the results revealed that the glass samples contain TeO2 possess higher μ/ρ values than the samples contain SiO2. For the B2O3–GeO2–Gd2O3–Eu2O3–GdF3–BaF2 glasses, we found that the μ/ρ values decrease as BaF2 is increased from 0 to 15 mol%. Moreover, it is found that 50Sb-0Ge for series 1, TWG0 for series 2, 2G4T for series 3 and X = 0 for series 4 glass samples among the studied glasses have the highest effective atomic number values. On the basis of the results achieved, 50Sb-0Ge, TWG0, 2G4T and X = 0 samples have the best radiation shielding characteristics among the selected glasses.