Gamma-ray induced thermoluminescence emission of green synthesized zinc oxide nanophosphors

The thermoluminescence (Thermally stimulated luminescence) technique has been applied in the field of radiation dosimetry and was found to be highly successful in dating ancient pottery samples. It is also used in the study of biological and biochemical systems. The present study reports the gamma-ray exposed thermoluminescence (TL) emission of ZnO nanophosphors. ZnO nanoparticles were prepared via phyto-mediated green routes according to our previous works. Different analytical techniques such as XRD, FESEM, HRTEM, XPS, EDS, FTIR, and UV-DRS were employed to characterize the samples. The ZnO nanoparticles possess hexagonal wurtzite crystal structure of with 29–71 ​nm particle dimension. TL emission of the samples was recorded with different gamma dosages10-50 Gy at a constant heating rate of 2^oCs^-1. A broad single glow curve above 300 ​°C was exhibited by the samples and good linearity was reserved in integrated TL profiles. The TL emission follows first-order kinetics and the activation energies of the traps located in the samples were determined.