Mass spectrometric analyses of high performance polymers to assess radiopurity as ultra low background materials for rare event physics detectors
| Autor: | Jay W. Grate, Sonia Alcantar Anguiano, I. J. Arnquist, Eric W. Hoppe, Maria Laura di Vacri, Khadouja Harouaka, Mary Bliss |
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| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2020 |
| Předmět: |
Physics
chemistry.chemical_classification Nuclear and High Energy Physics Physics - Instrumentation and Detectors 010308 nuclear & particles physics Polyamide-imide Radiochemistry FOS: Physical sciences Polymer Instrumentation and Detectors (physics.ins-det) 010403 inorganic & nuclear chemistry Mass spectrometry Polyetherimide 01 natural sciences 0104 chemical sciences High Energy Physics - Experiment Polyetherketoneketone chemistry.chemical_compound High Energy Physics - Experiment (hep-ex) chemistry Ashing 0103 physical sciences Peek Instrumentation Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry |
| Popis: | The mass concentrations of 232Th and 238U in several strong, unfilled, high performance polymers are reported as measures of their radiopurity. Highly radiopure polymers are required as dielectric materials in the construction of rare event physics detectors, in order to minimize background signals arising from the detector materials themselves. New data are reported for carefully sourced samples of polyetheretherketone (PEEK), polyetherketoneketone (PEKK), a polyamide imide (PAI, branded as Torlon) and polybenzimidazole (PBI). Data for solid polyetherimide (PEI) are also discussed and new data for PEI in the form of a commercial 3D printing filament stock are reported. Strong high performance polymers PEKK, PBI, PAI and PEI were found with levels for 232Th and 238U that are below one mBq/kg, including the PEI 3D printing filament. Specifically, for 232Th and 238U respectively, in μ Bq/kg (emphasis “micro”Bq/kg), we found values of 149 and 184 for Arkema Kepstan PEKK 6002 flake; 69 and 2250 for Solvay Ketaspire PEEK flake; 346 and 291 for PBI Performance Products low metals grade 100 mesh PBI powder; 66 and 105 for Drake Plastics PAI Torlon T-4200 pellets; 401 and 285 for Drake Plastics cured PAI rod; 32 and 41 for Ensinger PEI Ultem 1000 solid; and 15 and 85 μ Bq/kg, for ThermaX PEI Ultem 1010 filament material. These results were all obtained using a novel dry ashing method in crucibles constructed of ultra low background (ULB) electroformed copper. Samples were spiked with 229Th and 233U as internal standards prior to ashing and determinations were made by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Radiopurity is displayed graphically relative to numerical measures of mechanical strength for these and several other polymers. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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