QA measurement of gamma-ray dose and neutron activation using TLD-400 for BNCT beam

TLD-400 (CaF₂:Mn) chips were applied for the gamma-ray dose measurement in a PMMA phantom exposed to a BNCT beam because of their very low neutron sensitivity. Since TLD-400 chips possess an adequate amount of Mn activator they have been employed in this work simultaneously for neuron activation measurement. The self-irradiation TL signals owing to the decay of the neutron induced ⁵⁶Mn activity have been applied for a calibration of the TLD-400 chip in situ, where the activities were measured by an HPGe detector system and the energy deposition per disintegration of ⁵⁶Mn was calculated by applying a Monte Carlo code. It was accidentally found that the irradiated TLD-400 chips were capable of emitting prominent scintillation lights owing to the induced ⁵⁶Mn activity, which can easily be recorded by the TLD reader without heating and after a calibration can be used to determine the ⁵⁶Mn activity.