GammaRay Interactions with Matter（伽马射线与物质的相互作用）.pdf

2 Gamma-Ray Interactions with Matter G. Nelson and D. ReWy 2.1 INTRODUCTION A knowledge of gamma-ray interactions is important to the nondestructive assayist in order to understand gamma-ray detection and attenuation. A gamma ray must interact with a detector in order to be “seen.” Although the major isotopes of uranium and plutonium emit gamma rays at fixed energies and rates, the gamma-ray intensity measured outside a sample is always attenuated because of gamma-ray interactions with the sample. This attenuation must be carefully considered when using gamma-ray NDA instruments. This chapter discusses the exponential attenuation of gamma rays in bulk mater- ials and describes the major gamma-ray interactions, gamma-ray shielding, filtering, and collimation. The treatment given here is necessarily brief. For a more detailed discussion, see Refs. 1 and 2. 2.2 EXPONENTIAL A~ATION Gamma rays were first identified in 1900 by Becquerel and VMard as a component of the radiation from uranium and radium that had much higher penetrability than alpha and beta particles. In 1909, Soddy and Russell found that gamma-ray attenuation followed an exponential law and that the ratio of the attenuation coefficient to the density of the attenuating material was nearly constant for all materials. 2.2.1 The Fundamental Law of Gamma-Ray Attenuation Figure 2.1 illustrates a simple attenuation experiment. When gamma radiation of intensity IO is incident on an absorber of thickness L, the emerging intensity (I) transmitted by the absorber is given by the exponential expression (2-i)