Plastic scintillator-based radiation detector for mobile radiation detection system against nuclear/radiological terrorism

Illicit trafficking of nuclear or radioactive materials has become a serious world wide problem. Due to operational constraints of radiation detection system for such nuclear security application, a radiation detector with large effective area is needed to maximize its sensitivity. This paper suggests a new method of using plastic scintillation detector as a cost-effective mobile radiation detection system. Monte Carlo simulation code, MCNPX, has been used to analyze spectral distribution available from the plastic detector and to derive algorithmic process with a view to discriminating targeted sources from ambient background radiation. Theoretical results in present work showed that the targeted sources which might be used for nuclear/radiological terrorism could be discriminated from Nationally Occurring Radioactive Material (NORM) or background.