Scattering of gamma radiation by air in the ambient environment using gamma ray spectrometry

Abstract

The intensity of gamma radiation reduces as it traverses through matter. The gamma radiation from earth’s surface is attenuated by non-radioactive burden between the ground and the detector. The relative intensity of unscattered to scattered gamma radiation by air in ambient atmosphere is measured using in-situ gamma spectrometric method. The air thickness up to 300 cm is used for studying attenuation of terrestrial gamma radiation. No significant attenuation is measured up to 100 cm thickness of air between the detector and the ground. The attenuation by air is found to increase with increasing thickness of air. Also, the attenuation of terrestrial gamma radionuclides (40K) is found higher than 238U and 232Th as 40K has lower energy compared to them.