Spectral interference corrections for the measurement of 238U in materials rich in thorium by a high resolution γ-ray spectrometry

Correction methodology for the spectral interfering γ-rays overlapping to the analytical peaks used in the analysis of 232Th

“…In other words, the absence or presence of an interfering radionuclide or its activity level besides the measured radionuclide of interest affects the spectrum complexity. Further, the activity degree of each radionuclide in sample plays an important role to this contribution (Yücel et al, 2009b). Hence the results for peak area proportion in Table 5 are weighted for each peak from those peak proportions, r in the range of contributions.…”

“…However, in literature survey, the methods relating to the estimation of the contributions from the interference peaks overlapping to the analytical peak of interest is still lacking or open to the investigation, which is important in view of obtaining more reliable peak area determinations. On the other hand, in recent years, a few complete papers have been published for the estimation of the spectral peak interferences to the analytical peaks used for 238 U and 226 Ra and their decay products (Papachristodoulou et al, 2003;De Corte et al, 2005;Yücel et al, 2009b;Yücel et al, 2010). Further, our previous investigations have also indicated that corrections for the spectral interferences (CSI) to an analytical peak needs to have more specific equations used for each peak but this can easily be implemented in the gamma spectrometric data evaluation by using the simple analytical procedures.…”

“…Hence, this peak has already been chosen as a ''reference peak'' in our earlier study to correct for the spectral contribution of the 63.81 keV peak of 232 Th to the 63.3 keV peak at of 234 Th for the measurement of 238 U activity (Yücel et al, 2009b). However, this ''reference'' analytical peak at 338.3 keV of 228 Ac will be reexamined in detail for the purpose of 232 Th analysis whether it has possible TCS effects in case of a close-in detection geometry and the influence on the net peak area due to its spectrally interfering g-rays.…”

Measurement of Activity Concentration of Radon in Wheat and Barley Samples in Thi Qar Province /Iraq/Using Diffusion Chamber Detection Technique

“…Radium is one of the major sources of radioactivity found in food and water (Yücel et al, 2009). 226R is a decay product of the uranium in naturally occurring series of the uranium, 226Ra is one of the most radiotoxic radionuclide with very long half-life (1600 years).…”

Determination of the natural radioactivity in Qatarian building materials using high-resolution gamma-ray spectrometry

“…(6) The criterion of this model considers that the external hazard due to gamma-rays corresponds to a 40 maximum radium-equivalent activity of 370 Bq/kg for the material [12,18]. The external hazard index should be below the unity [17].…”