Difficulties and improvement in growth of Europium doped Strontium Iodide (SrI2:Eu2+) scintillator single crystal for radiation detection applications

The molten salt of Strontium Iodide (SrI2) and Europium Iodide (EuI2) was filtered by specially designed dual chamber quartz ampoule using micro frit filter. Eu2+ doped SrI2 single crystal was grown by modified transparent vertical Bridgman technique. Photoluminescence (PL) excitation and emission (PLE) were recorded for the grown crystal. The characteristic emission of Eu2+ was observed at 432 nm. Similar emission was observed at 435 nm, when the sample was excited by X-ray source also. Scintillation properties of the SrI2:Eu2+ crystal were checked by the gamma ray spectrometer using 137Cs, 57Co and 60Co gamma sources. The energy resolutions of the grown crystal were found to be 4.6% at 662 KeV, 7.5% at 122 KeV and 9.8% at 1332 KeV. The Scintillation decay profile was also analyzed. The scintillation decay time of Eu2+ ion was calculated to be 1.26 μs for SrI2:Eu2+ single crystal.