Study on “spectrum stabilization method” of laboratory high-purity germanium γ spectrometers

Abstract

BackgroundThe "peak drift" is an important factor affecting the measurement accuracy of the γ spectrometer.PurposeThis study aims to quickly identify and correct the "peak drift" of the high-purity germanium (HPGe) γ spectrometer in laboratory.MethodsA novel "the natural radionuclide characteristic peak spectrum stabilization method" was proposed in detail. Instead of characteristic energy peak of standard radioactive source, this method made use of the characteristic peak of natural radionuclide K-40 to identify "peak drift" and correct the "peak drift" of HPGe γ spectrometer. The effectiveness of this method on the ORTEC HPGe gamma spectrometer was verified by using liquid multi nuclide standard source and standard point source 60Co.Results & ConclusionThe results show that this "natural radionuclide characteristic peak spectrum stabilization method" has advantages of simple operation, fast peak recognition, and real-time accurate correction, which is suitable for the measurement of the γ nuclides in laboratory process system samples.

Keywords

• hpge γ spectrometer
• peak drift
• spectrum-stabilization