Chemically bonded tungsten-based polymer composite for X-rays shielding applications

Lead-free metal-polymer composite based X-ray shielding apparel has been of great concern in recent years due to its flexibility, less toxicity, lightweight, etc. The conventional metal-polymer composites based apparels suffers from non-uniform attenuation due to the non-uniform distribution of fillers in the polymer matrix. In this work, efforts were made to address this drawback by developing a chemically bonded metal-polymer composite by incorporating tungsten trioxide (WO 3 ) solution in the blend of polyvinyl alcohol and polyvinyl pyrrolidone. Developed composites were characterized and their X-ray attenuation properties were determined using the X-ray tube voltage of 50–140 kV. The XRD and SEM analyses revealed the formation of the sodium tungstate (Na 2 WO 4 .2H 2 O) phase and its uniform distribution in the polymer matrix, respectively. FT-IR and XPS data showed the formation of a coordinate bond between the W and polymer matrix, which is responsible for the uniform distribution of W-based filler. The polymer composite made with 17 % of WO 3 loading is found to be optimum. The 2.35 mm thick sample possesses the attenuation equivalent to 0.25 mm lead at 100 kV, which is recommended by IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) to fabricate radiation shielding aprons to attenuate scattered X-rays. The developed composite shows a tensile strength of 4.6 MPa, which is suitable for fabricating wearable radiation shields. Chemical bonding route for development of W-PVA-PVP composite for shielding X-rays