Determination of the gamma and X-ray emission intensities of erbium-169

Abstract

The gamma and X-ray emission intensities of 169Er were determined using radionuclidically pure 169Er. The activity of the 169Er source was standardized by the triple-to-double-coincidence ratio technique. Three independent measurements were performed to measure the emission intensities using calibrated high-purity germanium spectrometers. The efficiencies were computed with the Monte Carlo method and validated using several experimental measurements. Final results present a large uncertainty reduction compared to previous evaluations. The emission intensities per decay of 169Er are reported as 1.401(40).10−5 for the 109.8 keV line and 1.513(19).10−6 for the 118.2 keV line. The values obtained for the X-ray lines show large discrepancies with the reference values.