Contribution to the use of data processing to establish instrumental multi-element activation analysis as a routine method

Abstract

A computer program has been worked out for the following requirements: (1) The program is to render a listing of the elements detected, together with their respective concentrations, not just an evaluation of the gamma-spectrum (peak energies and areas). (2) There should be no necessity to intermediate decisions, i.e. execution of the program should be possible by auxiliary personnel. (3) Gamma-ray spectra recorded under widely different conditions should be amenable to evaluation. This implies a large range of variation of the number of channels per peak. (4) In order to have the most extensive capability of executing multi-element analyses instrumentally, it must be possible to evaluate complex spectra with many superpositions. The program involves the fitting of Gaussians. It is shown that this evaluation method gives more precise peak area determinations than the summation method and also yields reasonable results in the case of strong superposition.