On the determination of activation energy and the order of kinetics in thermoluminescence

Abstract

The study of thermoluminescence (TL) glow-peaks forms the background of important and useful methods for estimating the kinetic parameters such as activation energy and the order of kinetics . These parameters are, in general, determined by using glow curve deconvolution or peak shape methods. In the present paper, we have investigated the suitability of the modified peak shape method and Kirsh method in order to perform simultaneous evaluation of these kinetic parameters and in TL. For this purpose, we have considered numerically computed TL peaks resulting from (i) General Order Kinetics model, (ii) Non-interactive MultiTrap System model (or Modified One Trap One Recombination centre (M-OTOR) model), and (iii) Interactive MultiTrap System model. We have also considered the application of these methods to experimental TL glow peaks of γ-irradiated colourless calcite that exhibits two intense TL glow peaks at 516 and 613 K, respectively. Theoretical results obtained by using different methods corresponding to different models show good agreement with experiments and, hence, point towards the model independence of methods under consideration, except the cases of strong retrapping.