LAUSR

Abstract Mass attenuation coefficients (μm), half value layer (HVL), effective atomic cross sections (σa), effective atomic numbers (Zeff) and effective electron densities (Neff) of borate glasses containing different concentrations of BaO, Bi2O3, and PbO (20–50% by mole) were obtained in the energy range of 10 keV–10 MeV using MCNPX code, XCOM and XMuDat programs, Auto-Zeff software and linear interpolation method. The simulated and calculated results were in good agreement with the experimental data with differences of ≤ ± 11%. It was found that σa and Zeff of glass samples improve by increasing their BaO, PbO and Bi2O3 contents, while increasing these contents to the same fraction has no significant effect on μm values in the energy range of 0.3–6 MeV, where the Compton Effect takes over as dominant process. In addition, the μm and σa values of glasses decreased with photon energy and bismuth oxide borate glass obtained the highest values of μm and σa. Also, HVL values of the studied glasses decreased with the increase in their densities. The 50Bi2O3:50B2O3 glass system had the highest Zeff value of 55.60 at the 30 keV photon energy. Above 0.4 MeV photon energy, Neff values were independent of the metal oxides contents. The Neff values of the studied glass systems varied in the range of 2.77 × 1023 – 9.10 × 1023 electron/g.