Light Output Response of GSO(Ce) Crystals to Relativistic Carbon Ions

We have investigated the light output response of a GSO(Ce) crystal to carbon ions of energy up to 3.34 GeV. An experiment was carried out with HIMAC at National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Chiba, Japan. The incident energy of carbon beam was changed by inserting target materials with different thicknesses as degraders. Experimental results were consistent with the calculated curve by Birks equation, and the light output plotted as a function of deposited energy in the GSO(Ce) crystal showed a slight non-linearity in the low energy region and a good linearity in the higher energy region above around 1.5 GeV.