1/28/13 Activity

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Radiography

Introduction
Activity (of Radionuclides) History
Pre se nt State
Future Dire ction

The quantity which expresses the degree of Physics of Radiography

Nature of Pe ne trating
radioactivity or the radiation producing R adiation
potential of a given amount of radioactive X-rays
Gam m a R ays
material is activity. The curie was originally Activity
De cay R ate
defined as that amount of any radioactive -C arbon 14 Dating
Ionization
material that disintegrates at the same rate as Inve rse Square Law
one gram of pure radium. The curie has Inte raction of R T/Matte r
Atte nuation C oe fficie nt
since been defined more precisely as a Half-Value Laye r
Source s of Atte nuation
quantity of radioactive material in which 3.7 -C om pton Scatte ring
x 1010 atoms disintegrate per second. The Ge om e tric Unsharpne ss
Filte rs in R adiography
International System (SI) unit for activity is Scatte r/R adiation C ontrol
R adiation Safe ty
the Becquerel (Bq), which is that quantity of
radioactive material in which one atom is Equipment & Materials
X-ray Ge ne rators
transformed per second. The radioactivity of R adio Isotope Source s
a given amount of radioactive material does R adiographic Film
Ex posure Vaults
not depend upon the mass of material present. For example, two one-curie sources of Cs-137
might have very different masses depending upon the relative proportion of non-radioactive Techniques & Calibrations
Im aging C onside ration
atoms present in each source. Radioactivity is expressed as the number of curies or becquerels C ontrast
De finition
per unit mass or volume. R adiographic De nsity
C haracte ristic C urve s
Ex posure C alculations
The concentration of radioactivity, or the relationship between the mass of radioactive material C ontrolling Q uality
and the activity, is called "specific activity." Specific activity is expressed as the number of curies Film Proce ssing
Vie wing R adiographs
or becquerels per unit mass or volume. Each gram of cobalt-60 will contain approximately 50 R adiograph Inte rp-W e lds
R adiograph Inte rp -
curies. Iridium-192 will contain 350 curies for every gram of material. The shorter half-life, the C astings
less amount of material that will be required to produce a given activity or curies. The higher
specific activity of iridium results in physically smaller sources. This allows technicians to place AR edvanced Techniques
al-tim e R adiography
the source in closer proximity to the film while maintaining geometric unsharpness requirements C om pute d Tom ography
XR SIM
on the radiograph. These unsharpness requirements may not be met if a source with a low
specific activity were used at similar source to film distances. R e fe re nce s

Quizzes
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