Barros, Silvia; Gallego Díaz, Eduardo; Lorente, Alfredo; Goncalves, Isabel; Vaz, Pedro; Vega Carrillo, Héctor René; Zankl, Maria
Resumen:
The neutron Howitzer container at the Neutron Measurements Laboratory of the Nuclear Engineering
Department of the Polytechnic University of Madrid (UPM), is equipped with a 241Am-Be neutron source of
74 GBq in its center. The container allows the source to be in either the irradiation or the storage position. To
measure the neutron fluence rate spectra around the Howitzer container, measurements were performed using
a Bonner spheres spectrometer and the spectra were unfolded using the NSDann program. A calibrated
neutron area monitor LB6411 was used to measure the ambient dose equivalent rates, H
*(10). Detailed
Monte-Carlo simulations were performed to calculate the measured quantities at the same positions. The
maximum relative deviation between simulations and measurements was 19.53%. After validation, the
simulated model was used to calculate the equivalent dose rate, HT, in several key organs of a voxel phantom.
The computed HT in the skin and lenses of the eyes are within the ICRP recommended dose limits, as is the
H*(10) value for the storage position.