Role of alpha particles in the bulk etching rate of CR-39 nuclear track detector

Abstract

Solid state nuclear track detectors have different application in different branches of science, because it has been used as a passive system to detect the alpha particles. It is important to measure the bulk-etching rate for CR-39 detector, which is sensitive to all alpha particles reaching its surface at normal incidence. The effect of irradiation α-particles intensity emitted from 241Am with energy 5.49 MeV on CR-39 detector was studied. From the obtained results the values of bulk etching rate decrease with increasing alpha energy and the number of tracks increasing with increasing alpha energy. It is important to identify the time required for the chemical etching process at certain alpha energy.