Fabrication, microstructural modifications, elastic properties and radiation attenuation performance of ZnO nano-sized particles-reinforced Pb-based alloys for radiation shielding applications

We intended to obtain new appropriate materials suitable for radiation protection applications. Therefore, the choice of appropriate materials in industrial and medical applications has become one of the major research topics. An attempt has been made to conceive the possibility of using different compositions Sn-40Pb, Sn-39.5Pb-ZnO, Zn-40Pb and Zn-39.5Pb-ZnO were prepared and synthesized by the melt-spun process. This work aims to investigate the effects of rapid solidification processing and loading 0.5 wt.% ZnO NPs into the Sn- and Zn-based binary systems and the stability of the structure, mechanical and shielding properties. The structure revealed that the plain and composite alloys contain the crystalline beta-Sn (body-centred tetragonal), alpha-Pb (cubic) Fm-3 m for the Sn-Pb system in addition to alpha-Pb(fcc), Zn (Hexagonal) P63/mmc and revealed ZnO (Zincite) P63mc for the Zn-Pb system. Doping ZnO nano-sized cause refines the eutectic structure as revealed in microstructural morphology. The experimentally measured density values for the plain and composite alloys have been used in evaluating the linear attenuation coefficient, which is further used to calculate mass, attenuation coefficient, mean free path, half value layer and tenth value layer. Furthermore, the variation of a mean free path, HVL and TVL with incident photon energy for the binary and composite alloys has been investigated. It was found that nano-ZnO-doped Sn-Pb and Zn-Pb enhance the amount of radiation absorbed in the material inside and as a result of which affected the radiation attenuation properties of the material. It was concluded and recommended that the composite alloys containing ZnO NPs can be used effectively as a shielding material for gamma rays with a comparable attenuation percentage compared with plain alloys.