Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Radiation Physics and Chemistry journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/radphyschem Poly (phosphate-co-carbonate) polymers for solid state nuclear track detection application Diptesh G. Naik, Vishnu S. Nadkarni ⁎ Department of Chemistry, Goa University, India ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Triallyl phosphate (TAP) Allyl diglycol carbonate Pentaerythritol tetrakis allyl carbonate (PETAC) Copolymerization Solid state nuclear track detection (SSNTD) Dosimetry ABSTRACT Polymers of triallyl phosphate (TAP) with allyl diglycol carbonate (ADC), pentaerythritol tetrakis allyl carbonate (PETAC) and N-allyloxycarbonyldiethanolaminebis (allyl carbonate) (NADAC) monomers have been prepared and copolymerized with ADC to get poly (ADC-co-TAP), poly (TAP-co-PETAC) and poly (TAP-co-NADAC) polymers respectively for solid state nuclear track detection applications. The developed polymers have tested successfully as a solid state nuclear track detector for alpha particles and fission fragments for the first time. All monomers synthesized were characterized by IR, 1 H, and 13 C NMR spectra. The copolymers of TAP with ADC in different proportions were also prepared and tested for track detection characteristics. The optimum chemical etching condition for the poly (TAP-co-ADC) detector was found to be 7 M NaOH at 70 °C. The polymeric films were optimized for use as solid state nuclear track detectors. Track detection parameters of the copolymeric films were compared with that of commercial PADC detector. It is found that copolymer poly (TAP-co-ADC, 3;7 w/w) showed enhanced alpha sensitivity as compared to that of commercial PADC detector. 1. Introduction The technique of solid state nuclear track detection (SSNTD) is well established over almost six decades. A huge work has been done to study nuclear tracks using insulating materials like minerals, glasses, and polymers since the year 1958, after its discovery by Young (1958). Mica, mineral glasses and polycarbonate materials were used for neu- tron dosimetric analysis (Walker et al., 1963). Many scientists have studied phosphate containing glasses as solid state nuclear track de- tectors. (Becker, 1966) used phosphate glass (make Toshiba Co. Ltd.) for the first time for thermal and fast neutron dosimetry in mixed ra- diation field. He also discussed different methods for optical assessment of the fission track density in glasses and studied the effect of foil radioactivity and the neutron fission fragments on the glass radio photoluminescence. (Price et al., 1987a, 1987b) have already reported a very sensitive phosphate glass detector called VG-13. But, it has many disadvantages due to its uranium content and it easily corrodes in air. This was followed by (Shicheng et al., 1988) who developed barium phosphate glass (BP1) with high charge resolution and sensitivity among glasses. They made an efficient search of phosphate glasses of various compositions which were free from uranium. BP1 glass material was colorless and transparent, composed of P 2 O 5 65, BaO 25, NaO 5, and SiO 2 5 wt% and no uranium. Sensitivity of this material towards ionizing particles was higher as compared to that of VG-13. (Bonetti et al., 1991) have carried out cali- bration of a phosphate glass BP-1 due to its high sensitivity comparable to that of some polymers. PB-1 glass detector was used in different cluster radioactivity study to detect carbon or oxygen ions. Further (Bonetti et al., 1997; Moody et al., 1987) have also calibrated LG 750 phosphate glass with heavy ion beams, as it is known previously that LG750 phosphate glass is suitable to detect cluster radioactivity because of its very high tolerance of alpha dose. It is well known that polymeric track detectors are handier and more sensitive compared to glasses and find maximum applications. It is therefore that polymeric detectors like ni- trocellulose (LR115), Poly (allyl diethylene glycol) carbonate (PADC), Bisphenol-A polycarbonate (Lexan) are commercially available and are used in most applications. PADC polymeric detector (Cartwright et al., 1978) is on the forefront because of its high sensitivity to many charged particles. Since 1996, our group is involved in synthesizing /designing novel monomers and polymeric detectors for solid state nuclear track detection to find detectors with better dosimetric properties. We (Mandrekar et al., 2010, 2008; Mascarenhas et al., 2006, 2009, 2005) have already reported some novel polymeric track detectors for charged particle detection studies over this period. We have also proposed a systematic stepwise method (Nadkarni, 2009) for development of poly- meric material to be used as a SSNTD. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.radphyschem.2018.11.027 Received 8 May 2018; Received in revised form 22 November 2018; Accepted 26 November 2018 ⁎ Correspondence to: Department of Chemistry, Goa University, FRL-11, Block-E, Taleigao Plateau, North Goa, Goa 403206, India. E-mail address: nitin@unigoa.ac.in (V.S. Nadkarni). Radiation Physics and Chemistry 156 (2019) 259–265 Available online 29 November 2018 0969-806X/ © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T