Comparison of photoneutron yield from beryllium irradiated with bremsstrahlung radiation of different peak energy

In an effort to set up microtron based photoneutron source and in order to optimize the neutron yield, photoneutron production from beryllium has been studied for different volumes of beryllium irradiated by different peak energy bremsstrahlung radiation. The theoretical estimation of neutron yield has been carried out using the MCNP simulation for 8.75, 8.15 and 7.58 MeV peak energy of bremsstrahlung radiation. The experimental measurements were carried out using two types of detectors: SSNTD CR-39 and custom designed Silver wrapped GM detector. The neutron yield corresponding to beryllium of volume 381.70 cm3 are found to be 2.13E+09, 2.00E+09 and 1.74E09 n/s (MCNP calculation values) for electrons of energy 8.75, 8.17 and 7.48 MeV, respectively. The experimental results are compared with the MCNP simulated results and are good agreement.