Design and performance analysis of a compact magnetic proton recoil spectrometer for DT neutrons

Abstract：

A magnetic proton recoil (MPR) spectrometer is a novel instrument with superior performance, including high energy resolution, high count rate and good signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) for measurements of neutron spectra from inertial confinement fusion (ICF) experiments and high power Tokomaks. In this work, the design of a compact MPR spectrometer (cMPR) was evaluated for deuteron-tritium (DT) neutron spectroscopy. The characteristics of the spectrometer were analyzed using 2-D beam transport simulations, 3-D particle transport calculations and Monte-Carlo simulations. Based on the theoretical results, an instrument design that satisfies special experimental requirements is proposed. The energy resolution and efficiency of the spectrometer are also evaluated. The results indicate that the proposed cMPR spectrometer would achieve a detection efficiency and energy resolution of approximately 10^-8 and 4%, respectively, for DT neutrons.