Radiochromic Plastic Films for Accurate Measurement of Radiation Absorbed Dose and Dose Distributions

Thin radiochromic dye films are useful for measuring large radiation absorbed doses (105–108 rads) and for high-resolution imaging of dose patterns produced by penetrating radiation beams passing through non-homogeneous media. Certain types of amino-substituted triarylmethane cyanides dissolved in polymeric solutions can be cast into flexible free-standing thin films of uniform thickness and reproducible response to ultraviolet and ionizing radiation. The increase in optical density versus energy deposited by radiation is linear over a wide range of doses and is for practical purposes independent of dose rate (1–1014 rad s−1). Upon irradiation of the film, the profile of the radiation field is registered as a permanent colored image of the dose distribution. Unlike most other types of dyed plastic dose meters, the optical density produced by irradiation is in most cases stable for periods of at least one year. Methods have been developed for casting various types of thin radiochromic plastic films and combinations of plastics (cellulose acetate, polyvinyl butyral, polyvinyl acetate, polyvinyl pyrrolidone and polyvinyl chloride) having radiation absorption characteristics corresponding to those of many polymeric systems in industrial radiation processing. The result is that errors due to energy dependence of response of the radiation sensor are effectively reduced, since the spectral sensitivity of the dose meter matches that of the polymer of interest, over a wide range of photon and electron energies (0.01–10 MeV).