Fabrication and experimental evaluation of microstructured <sup>6</sup>Li silicate fiber arrays for high spatial resolution neutron imaging

This work presents the fabrication and experimental evaluation of instrumentation designed to enable higher spatial resolution neutron radiography for those performing research at neutron scattering facilities. Herein, we describe a proof-of-concept array of microstructured silicate fibers with  6Li doped cores that shows progress towards a design for μ m resolution neutron radiography. The multicore fiber was fabricated by drawing stacked unit elements of Guardian Glass (Nucsafe Inc., Oak Ridge, TN, USA), a  6Li scintillating core glass, and a silicate cladding glass. These structured fibers function as an array of sub-10- μ m waveguides for scintillation light. Measurements have shown a significantly increased integrated charge distribution in response to neutrons, and the spatial resolution of the radiographs is described by edge response and line spread functions of 48 ± 4 μ m and 59 ± 8 μ m , respectively.

这项工作介绍了一种仪器的制造和实验评估，该仪器旨在为在中子散射设施进行研究的人员实现更高空间分辨率的中子射线照相。在此，我们描述了一个概念验证的微结构硅酸盐纤维阵列，其纤芯掺杂了⁶Li，这显示了在实现微米分辨率中子射线照相设计方面取得的进展。多芯光纤是通过拉制Guardian Glass（美国田纳西州橡树岭的Nucsafe公司）的堆叠单元元件、一种⁶Li闪烁芯玻璃以及一种硅酸盐包层玻璃制成的。这些结构化纤维用作闪烁光的亚10微米波导阵列。测量结果表明，对中子的响应中积分电荷分布显著增加，并且射线照片的空间分辨率分别由48±4微米和59±8微米的边缘响应函数和线扩展函数来描述。