Airborne gamma-ray spectroscopy for modeling cosmic radiation and effective dose in the lower atmosphere

Abstract

In this paper we present the results of a $\sim$5 hour airborne gamma-ray survey carried out over the Tyrrhenian sea in which the height range (77-3066) m has been investigated. Gamma-ray spectroscopy measurements have been performed by using the AGRS_16L detector, a module of four 4L NaI(Tl) crystals. The experimental setup was mounted on the Radgyro, a prototype aircraft designed for multisensorial acquisitions in the field of proximal remote sensing. By acquiring high-statistics spectra over the sea (i.e. in the absence of signals having geological origin) and by spanning a wide spectrum of altitudes it has been possible to split the measured count rate into a constant aircraft component and a cosmic component exponentially increasing with increasing height. The monitoring of the count rate having pure cosmic origin in the >3 MeV energy region allowed to infer the background count rates in the ${}^{40}$K, ${}^{214}$Bi and ${}^{208}$Tl photopeaks, which need to be subtracted in processing airborne gamma-ray data in order to estimate the potassium, uranium and thorium abundances in the ground. Moreover, a calibration procedure has been carried out by implementing the CARI-6P and EXPACS dosimetry tools, according to which the annual cosmic effective dose to human population has been linearly related to the measured cosmic count rates.

arXiv comment25 pages, 10 figures, 5 tables

References in corpus (4)

• Measurement of the energy spectrum of cosmic rays above 10^18 eV using the Pierre Auger Observatory
• Accuracy of Flight Altitude Measured with Low-Cost GNSS, Radar and Barometer Sensors: Implications for Airborne Radiometric Surveys
• Exploring atmospheric radon with airborne gamma-ray spectroscopy
• A multivariate spatial interpolation of airborne γ-ray data using the geological constraints

Cited by in corpus (4)

• Accuracy of Flight Altitude Measured with Low-Cost GNSS, Radar and Barometer Sensors: Implications for Airborne Radiometric Surveys
• Investigating the potentialities of Monte Carlo simulation for assessing soil water content via proximal gamma-ray spectroscopy
• Exploring atmospheric radon with airborne gamma-ray spectroscopy
• Airborne Radiometric Surveys and Machine Learning Algorithms for Revealing Soil Texture