Plastic gamma sensors: an application in search of radioisotopes

A brief survey of plastic scintillators for various radiation measurement applications is presented here. The utility of plastic scintillators for practical applications such as gamma radiation monitoring, real-time radioisotope detection and screening is evaluated in laboratory and field measurements. This study also reports results of Monte Carlo-type predictive responses of common plastic scintillators in gamma and neutron radiation fields. Small-size plastic detectors are evaluated for static and dynamic gamma-ray detection sensitivity of selected radiation sources.