Integrated system for the irradiation of samples by alpha radioactive source for thermoluminescence analysis
[ NIDays 2016 - Forum Tecnologico sulla Progettazione Grafica di Sistemi - soluzioni e applicazioni 2016 ]
Publication date: May 29th, 2016
An instrument capable of holding and shielding a radioactive source of Am241, to work in a vacuum and implement user-set precise dosages, automatically calculating the exposure times needed to samples. The system displays in real time the status of the process and all parameters, managing alarms and security. The control and monitoring software has been developed in NI LabVIEW.
The realized instrumets serves to irradiate the sample by alpha source with known doses, so to verify which will be the TL emission obtained from that specific material with those precise parameters. This datum is then used to be interpolated with the emission due of natural TL measured on the sample and the radioactivity of environmental parameters. The actual instrument consists of a mechanical vacuum tight able to contain and shield an alpha source constituted by an isotope of americium, specifically Am241, which has a very long decay times, maintains its activities in the medium term (years) and has no secondary emissions that might interfere with the specific process. The calculations for the shielding and the calibration of the source in the instrument were performed in collaboration with the INFN- section of Turin.
The full body text is available in italian at the link below
