Physical, optical, and ionizing radiation shielding properties for barium–tellurite glass with different oxides: An experimental study

This study used the melt–quench technique to fabricate four glass systems based on barium–tellurite oxide (BaO–TeO₂) glass. The BaO–TeO₂ glass system was enhanced with metal oxides such as tungsten oxide (WO₃), yttrium oxide, strontium oxide, and lithium oxide. We studied the effects of these oxides as additives experimentally, focusing on their physical, optical, and radiation shielding properties. The fabricated glass density was 4.779–5.372 g/cm³ when different oxides were added. The physical properties of WO₃ indicated its superiority over other glasses, supported by the optical properties. We calculated the experimental mass attenuation coefficient for each synthesized sample and compared it to the XCOM software results to assess the radiation shielding efficacy. The difference between the two sets of results ranged from 0.1% to 9.7% for all samples. Furthermore, we calculated the linear attenuation coefficient for each sample, allowing us to determine several properties, such as the effective atomic number, half-value layer, radiation-protection efficiency, mean free path, and transmission factor. According to the gamma radiation shielding results, the sample with WO₃ had the best shielding properties, making it a good candidate for radiation shielding applications.