Uncertainties induced by statistical fluctuations in fast mono-energetic neutron yield measurements

Abstract：

A plastic scintillation detector was used to measure the yield of deuterium-deuterium (DD) neutrons or deuterium-tritium (DT) neutrons. Collisions of fast neutrons with hydrogen nucleus in a scintillator generated recoil protons, the energies of which were fully deposited in the scintillator. The statistical fluctuation of the protons' number and that of the protons' total energy were two sources of measurement uncertainty. Based on DT neutrons, this paper represents the algorithms of computing the probability density functions of the two sources. Uncertainties of the measurement induced by statistical fluctuations were finally computed by constructing the probability density functions of the proton number and that of the neutron number.