Design and operation of an electrostatic radon detection chamber.

摘要

his thesis describes the construction, calibration and background studies of a detection chamber to be used for the measurement of low levels of Radon gas, such as the amounts emanated by most normal materials. The chamber utilizes a Si surface barrier detector in such a way that a high negative electric potential can be placed upon the detection surface. This arangement induces deposition of positively charged particles onto the detector. Since a significant fraction of radon daughters are produced as positive ions during radioactive decay, the likelihood of the alpha particle produced in the subsequent decay being observed is increased. Calibrations with a radium solution standard yielded an optimum detection efficiency of (21.4