Mermod P, Blomgren J, Nilsson L, Pomp S, Ohrn A, Osterlund M, Prokofiev A, Tippawan U
Department of Neutron Research, Uppsala University, Box 525, S-75120 Uppsala, Sweden.
Radiat Prot Dosimetry. 2007;126(1-4):113-8. doi: 10.1093/rpd/ncm024. Epub 2007 Jun 16.
Recently, many new applications of fast neutrons are emerging or under development, like dose effects due to cosmic ray neutrons for airplane crew, fast neutron cancer therapy, studies of electronics failure induced by cosmic ray neutrons and accelerator-driven incineration of nuclear waste and energy production technologies. In radiation treatment, the kerma (Kinetic energy release in matter) coefficient, which describes the average energy transferred from neutrons to charged particles, is widely used. The kerma coefficient can be calculated from microscopic nuclear data. Nuclear data above 20 MeV are rather scarce, and more complete nuclear data libraries are needed in order to improve the understanding of the processes occurring on a cellular level. About half the dose in human tissue due to fast neutrons comes from proton recoils in neutron-proton (np) scattering, 10-15% from nuclear recoils due to elastic and inelastic neutron scattering and the remaining 35-40% from neutron-induced emission of light ions. Experimental data on elastic and inelastic neutron scattering at 96 MeV from (12)C and (16)O have been obtained recently at The Svedberg Laboratory in Uppsala, Sweden. These data are shown to be relevant for the determination of nuclear recoil kerma coefficients from elastic and inelastic neutron scattering at intermediate energies.
最近，快中子的许多新应用正在出现或正在开发中，比如宇宙射线中子对机组人员的剂量效应、快中子癌症治疗、宇宙射线中子引起的电子设备故障研究以及加速器驱动的核废料焚烧和能源生产技术。在放射治疗中，比释动能（物质中动能释放）系数被广泛使用，该系数描述了从中子转移到带电粒子的平均能量。比释动能系数可从微观核数据计算得出。20兆电子伏以上的核数据相当稀少，为了更好地理解细胞水平上发生的过程，需要更完整的核数据库。在人体组织中，快中子产生的剂量约一半来自中子 - 质子（np）散射中的质子反冲，10% - 15%来自弹性和非弹性中子散射引起的核反冲，其余35% - 40%来自中子诱发的轻离子发射。最近在瑞典乌普萨拉的斯韦贝里实验室获得了来自（12）C和（16）O的96兆电子伏弹性和非弹性中子散射的实验数据。这些数据表明与确定中能弹性和非弹性中子散射的核反冲比释动能系数相关。
