Radiation-induced emission of doped sol-gel silica glass samples was investigated under a pulsed 20-MeV electron beam. The studied samples were drawn rods doped with cerium, copper, or gadolinium ions, which were connected to multimode pure-silica core fibers to transport the induced luminescence from the irradiation area to a signal readout system. The luminescence pulses in the samples induced by the electron bunches were studied as a function of deposited dose per electron bunch. All the investigated samples were found to have a linear response in terms of luminescence as a function of electron bunch sizes between 10−5 Gy/bunch and 1.5×10−2 Gy/bunch. The presented results show that these types of doped silica rods can be used for monitoring a pulsed electron beam, as well as to evaluate the dose deposited by the individual electron bunches. The electron accelerator used in the experiment was a medical type used for radiation therapy treatments, and these silica rod samples show high potential for dosimetry in radiotherapy contexts.
The incorporation of Ce3+ ions in silicate glasses is a crucial issue for luminescence-based sensing applications. In this article, we report on silica glass preforms doped with cerium ions fabricated by modified chemical vapor deposition (MCVD) under different atmospheres in order to favor the Ce3+ oxidation state. Structural analysis and photophysical investigations are performed on the obtained glass rods. The preform fabricated under reducing atmosphere presents the highest photoluminescence (PL) quantum yield (QY). This preform drawn into a 125 µm-optical fiber, with a Ce-doped core diameter of about 40 µm, is characterized to confirm the presence of Ce3+ ions inside this optical fiber core. The fiber is then tested in an all-fibered X-ray dosimeter configuration. We demonstrate that this fiber allows the remote monitoring of the X-ray dose rate (flux) through a radioluminescence (RL) signal generated around 460 nm. The response dependence of RL versus dose rate exhibits a linear behavior over five decades, at least from 330 µGy(SiO2)/s up to 22.6 Gy(SiO2)/s. These results attest the potentialities of the MCVD-made Ce-doped material, obtained under reducing atmosphere, for real-time remote ionizing radiation dosimetry.
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