Optical and scintillation properties of Cs/sub 2/LiYCl/sub 6/:Ce/sup 3+/ and Cs/sub 2/LiYCl/sub 6/:Pr/sup 3+/ crystals

In this paper we report on the optical and scintillation properties of Cs/sub 2/LiYCl/sub 6/:Ce/sup 3+/ and Cs/sub 2/LiYCl/sub 6/:Pr/sup 3+/ crystals. Crystals of Cs/sub 2/LiYCl/sub 6/ doped with different Ce/sup 3+/ and Pr/sup 3+/ concentrations were grown and studied under optical, X-ray, gamma ray, and thermal neutron excitation. These scintillators exhibit core-valence and self-trapped exciton luminescence in addition to fast emission from Ce/sup 3+/ and Pr/sup 3+/. Efficient thermal neutron detection was observed for both scintillators. The position of the neutron peak in the pulse height spectra was found at about 5 times the channel number of the position of the /sup 137/Cs 662 keV gamma peak.