Eur. Phys. J. Plus (2017) 132: 271
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/i2017-11553-2

Regular Article

Determination of the effective atomic number of thick samples of unknown composition using scattering studies

DoS in Physics, University of Mysore, 570006, Mysuru, India

^* e-mail: tku@physics.uni-mysore.ac.in

Received: 21 November 2016
Accepted: 12 May 2017
Published online: 22 June 2017

Abstract

The effective atomic number ( is a quantity which gives the fraction of the total number of electrons in a composite material participating in the photon-atom interaction. The effective atomic number has been determined for the materials of known composition by using different methods. However, no method has been reported so far to determine for thick samples of unknown composition. In view of this, we have evolved a simple method to determine the effective atomic number, which uses the scattering intensity ratios measured at two scattering angles, in which a sample of known or Z is taken as a reference sample. The values of obtained by this method agree with those obtained from the Auto-Zeff software within the stated errors. This method could be helpful in determining the effective atomic number of samples of unknown composition.