IM.3.

The Geiger-Mller Counter

1. Purpose: Some measurements in nuclear decay, notions of statistics
2. Apparatus: Scaler-Timer (The Nucleus model 550),
Geiger-Mller tube,
oscilloscoe,
radioacti!e sources"
3. Introduction:
# tyical Geiger-Mller (GM) $ounter consists of a GM tube ha!ing a thin, mica end-%indo%, a high
!oltage suly for the tube, a scaler to record the number of articles detected by the tube, and a timer
%hich %ill sto the action of the scaler at the end of a reset inter!al"
The sensiti!ity of the GM tube is such that any article caable of ioni&ing a single atom of the
filling gas of the tube %ill initiate an a!alanche of ioni&ation in the tube" The collection of the
ioni&ation thus roduced results in the formation of a ulse of !oltage at the outut of the tube" The
amlitude of this ulse, on the order of a !olt or so, is sufficient to oerate the scaler circuit %ith little
further amlification" 'o%e!er, the ulse amlitude is largely indeendent of the roerties of the
article detected, and, therefore, can gi!e little information as to the nature of the article" (n site of
this fact, the GM $ounter is a !ersatile de!ice in that it may be used for counting alha articles, beta
articles, and gamma rays %ith, ho%e!er, !arying degrees of efficiency"
4. et-up:
Set u e)uiment as sho%n in *ig" +" Scaler, Timer, and 'igh ,oltage Suly may %ell be contained in
one ac-age"
+
!. Measure"ents to #e per$or"ed:
!.1 Characteristics o$ the GM counter:
.ut a radioacti!e source belo% the GM tube" .ut the counter in a counting mode and raise the
!oltage until counts are obser!ed" Note the shae of the ulse and %hat haens as the !oltage on the
GM tube is increased" /o not e0ceed 100 !olts at this time" 2hat is the minimum !oltage ulse
necessary to acti!ate the counter3 #fter roerly triggering the scoe, s-etch a icture of the ulse
shae" 'o% %ould you describe it3
4!ery GM tube has a characteristic resonse of counting rate !ersus !oltage alied to the tube"
# cur!e reresenting the !ariation of counting rate %ith !oltage is called a lateau cur!e because of its
aearance" The lateau cur!e of e!ery tube that is to be used for the first time should be dra%n in
order to determine the otimum oerating !oltage" *ind the lateau cur!e for your tube using the
rocedure outlined belo%"
#" $hec- to see that the high !oltage as indicated by the meter on the instrument is at its
minimum !alue"
5" (nsert a radioacti!e source into one of the shel!es of the counting chamber" $hoose shelf and
counting time such that you ha!e at least +000 counts in the lateau region"
$" Turn on the count s%itch and slo%ly increase the high !oltage until counts 6ust begin to be
recorded by the scaler" The !oltage at %hich counts 6ust begin is called the 7starting !oltage7 of
the tube"
/" 5eginning at the nearest 80 !olt mar- abo!e the starting !oltage, ta-e one-minute
(longer time if counting rate is too lo%) counts e!ery 90 !olts until a !oltage is reached %here a
raid increase in counts is obser!ed" :eset scaler to &ero before each count" Tabulate counts
!ersus !oltage"
4" .lot the data of (/)" # lateau should be obser!ed in the cur!e"
The otimum oerating !oltage %ill be about the middle of the lateau, usually some +50 to
800 !olts abo!e the -nee of the cur!e" Set the high !oltage to this oint and record"
The sloe S of the lateau of a GM tube ser!es as a figure of merit for the tube" The sloe is
defined to be the ercent change in count rate er +00 !olts change in alied !oltage in the lateau
region" # sloe of greater than +0; indicates that the tube should no longer be used for accurate %or-"
The sloe may be comuted using
8 (:8 - :+) +0
9
S (; er +00 ,) < ------------------------ (+)
(:8 = :+) (,8 - ,+)
%here ,8 is the !oltage at the high end of lateau, :8 is the count rate at this !oltage, ,+ is the !oltage
at the lo% end of the lateau, and :+ the corresonding rate" /o you understand this e)uation and can
you e0lain it3
(n order to comare, obtain a similar lateau cur!e for an old tube (if a!ailable)"
8
!.2 %esol&ing ti"e o$ the GM counter
There is an inter!al of time follo%ing the roduction of a ulse in the GM tube during %hich no
other ulse can be recorded" This inter!al is called the resol!ing time of the system"
(f this time is -no%n it can be used to ma-e a correction to the obser!ed count rate to yield the true
count rate" The rocedure belo% can gi!e a good estimate of the resol!ing time"
#" >btain a resol!ing time source (a ?slit source@) from the instructor"
This source is slit into t%o arts" :emo!e one half of the source and set it aside"
5" .lace the carrier containing one art on the second shelf of the counting chamber and ma-e
a trial count of + minute duration" Get the ma0imum count rate you can" 'oefully this
should be more than 80,000 counts er minute, but if not use %hat you can get"
$" Ma-e a A-minute count and record the counts er minute, :+"
/" .ut the t%o arts of the source bac- together, ta-ing care not to disturb the osition of the
first art" Ma-e a A-minute count of the combined arts and record as :c"
4" :emo!e the art initially counted and ma-e a A minute count on the second art"
:ecord as :8 (counts er minute)"
*" $alculate the resol!ing time of the GM system using the relationB
R1 + R2 - Rc
< -------------------- (8)
8R1R2
$on!ert the time thus found to microsecondsCcount and record" To understand the origin of the
e)uation, see refs D+ - AE"
The resol!ing time may be used to correct an obser!ed count rate using the e0ressionB
R = rC(+-r) (A)
%here
r < >bser!ed count rate
R < True count rate
To see the effect of the resol!ing time directly, use a !ery high rate source and !ie% the ulses
on the oscilloscoe"
!.3 tatistical treat"ent o$ counting data
The emission of articles by radioacti!e nuclei is a comletely random rocess" 2hen, under
identical conditions, a series of N measurements is made of the number of articles detected er unit
time it %ill be obser!ed that the indi!idual measurements %ill !ary about some a!erage or mean !alue"
The true mean, m, can be determined only by a!eraging an infinite number of measurements"
'o%e!er, for a finite number of obser!ations the best aro0imation of the true mean is simly the
arithmetic a!erage n
m n < (+CN) (n+ = n8 = nA = """" = nN) (9)
A
The magnitude of the de!iations of indi!idual measurements from the true mean is usually e0ressed
in terms of a Standard /e!iation, " The Standard /e!iation is defined to be the s)uare root of the
a!erage !alue of the s)uares of the indi!idual de!iations (rms < ?root-mean-s)uare@)" The number of
counts of radioacti!e decays for a fi0ed time is a random !ariable %hose robability distribution is a
.oisson distributionF the Standard /e!iation for such a distribution is simly the s)uare root of the true
meanB
< Gm (5)
The best aro0imation to the Standard /e!iation of a finite series of measurements is gi!en by the
s)uare root of the ?samle !ariance@,
n<DH(n+- n )
8
=(n8- n )
8
=""" =(nN- n )
8
ICN E
J
"" (K)
*or !alues of m L 80 the .oisson distribution can be !ery %ell aro0imated by the Gaussian (or
?normal@) distribution for %hich certain confidence le!els ha!e been established in terms of the
standard de!iation" These confidence le!els are as follo%sB

#bout KM; of the number of obser!ations made %ill fall %ithin the limits of n G n"
#bout 15; of the number of obser!ations made %ill fall %ithin the limits of n G 8n"
#bout 11; of the number of obser!ations made %ill fall %ithin the limits of n G An"
This means that if one additional measurement is made, it should ha!e a KM; chance of falling
%ithin n G n"
2hen circumstances ermit the ma-ing of only a single obser!ation the number of counts obtained, n,
is used as an estimator of and n as an estimator for its uncertainty (standard de!iation n)"
The Standard /e!iation of a gross counting rate, Rg isB
Rg < n Ct < t Rg /t <
t
Rg
(N), %here t is the duration of the counting"
This e0ression is ade)uate %hen the samle counting rates is much higher then the bac-ground
counting rate" 'o%e!er, %hen the bac-ground counting rate is areciable comared to the samle
counting rate the net counting rate, R, and its Standard /e!iation, r, are determined by
: < DRg
2
+ Rg
2
E
J
< D
g
g
t
R
=
b
b
t
R
E
J
(M)
%here
R < Net counting rate,
Rg < Gross counting rate of samle, " tg < .eriod used to determine Rg ,
Rb < 5ac-ground counting rate, tb < .eriod used to determine Rb .
To test the statistical nature of nuclear decay the follo%ing e0eriment can be erformedB
9
#" #d6ust the height of a source in the counting chamber to roduce about 8000
counts er minute"
5" Ta-e a set of +0 counts of A0 seconds duration"
$" $omute the arithmetic mean n "
/" $omute the standard de!iation s of the mean (for a .oisson distribution of mean n )"
*" $omute the indi!idual de!iations from the mean (ni - n ) and record in a table"
/o they sum !ery nearly to &ero3
G" S)uare the (ni - n ), sum the s)uare and aly 4)uation (K) to obtain the
standard de!iation n" $omare n %ith s
'" $ount the number of measurements %hose !alues lie %ithin n G n"
No% ta-e a second set of ten measurements and reeat the same analysis" $omare the t%o mean
!alues and sigmas" 'o% many measurements of set 8 fall %ithin the one sigma inter!al of the first
set3
!.4 'ac(ground Measure"ents
40traneous radiation called background radiation is al%ays resent" Gamma rays emitted by
certain radioisotoes in the ground, the air, and !arious building materials as %ell as cosmic radiation
from outer sace can all ro!ide counts in a detector in addition to those from a samle being
measured" This bac-ground counting rate should al%ays be subtracted from a samle counting rate in
order to obtain the rate from the samle alone" >btain a bac-ground counting rate using a 5-minute
samle time"
!.! )al$-li$e deter"ination o$ an un(no*n radioisotope
The acti!ity (number of disintegrations er second) of a radioisotoe is e0ressed as
#(t) < #o e
-t
(+0)
%here
#(t) < #cti!ity at the end of an inter!al t
#o < #cti!ity at the beginning of the inter!al t
e < 5ase of natural logarithm
< /ecay constant, characteristic of the radioisotoe
The half- life, TJ of a radioisotoe is defined to be that inter!al during %hich the acti!ity decreases to
one-half its !alue at the beginning of the internal" (n terms of half-life, the time deendence of the
acti!ity is
#(t) < #o e
-t ln8 C TJ
, %here TJ < ln8C (++)
The counting rate of a samle of a radioisotoe may be considered to be directly roortional to
the acti!ity at the moment of measurement ro!ided that the counting inter!al is short comared to the
half-life" :easonably short half-li!es can be determined by measuring acti!ity at regular inter!als"
5
The logarithm of the acti!ity %hen lotted as a function of elased time should yield oints falling in a
straight line" 2hy3
>btain your un-no%n samle from the instructor, measure the acti!ity as a function of time and find
the half-life"
+. Anal,sis- error esti"ation:
%esol&ing ti"e:
4stimate the uncertainty on your resol!ing time measurement from the uncertainties on the
number of counts (use .oisson uncertainties for these)"
)al$-li$e "easure"ent:
Oou should ta-e at least 80 measurements of the acti!ity, for half-minute inter!als" 'a!ing N
measurements of acti!ity gi!es you N-+ indeendent measurements of the half-life" 4stimate the
uncertainty on each indi!idual half-life measurement from the uncertainties on the number of counts
(remember that they are .oisson-distributedP)" /etermine the a!erage of all of these !alues, and
calculate the standard de!iation" ((f the uncertainties of these indi!idual measurements are !ery
different from each other, you may %ant to use a %eighted rather than a straight a!erage")
*urthermore, you can also determine the half-life from the sloe of the straight line in the lot of the
logarithm of the acti!ity !ersus elased time" The uncertainty on this sloe can also be used to estimate
an uncertainty on the half-life"
.. %eport:
Oour reort should ha!e a clear and comlete discussion of the rinciles underlying the functioning of
a GM $ounter, as %ell as its characteristics as determined from your e0erimental data" (n addition,
you should ha!e a comlete descrition of the data analysis, including determination of uncertainties"
Oou should treat e!ery ste in this e0eriment as a different measurement, %ith its data, analysis and
conclusion together in one section"
.. %e$erences:
D+E Glenn *" QnollB :adiation /etection and measurement,
Rohn 2iley S Sons, Ne% Oor- +1M1 (8
nd
ed"), +111 (A
rd
ed")
D8E 2illiam TeoB Techni)ues for Nuclear and .article .hysics 40eriments B
# 'o%-To #roachF
Sringer ,erlag, Ne% Oor- +119 (8
nd
ed")
DAE #" MelissinosB 40eriments in Modern .hysics, #cademic .ress, Ne% Oor- +1KK
D9E httBCColaris"hys"ualberta"caCinfoC.hys810CManualC++GM0+"df
D5E httBCC%%%"mathemati-"uni-marburg"deCU-ron6aegCh!CradioCgeigerCcaltechCe08"htm
DKE httBCC%%%"%arren-%ilson"eduCUslea!ittCformalCgeiger%ebage"htm
DNE httBCC%%%"home"fh--arlsruhe"deCUmero000+CmasterCgmVcounter"df
DME httBCC%%%"home"fh--arlsruhe"deCUmero000+CmasterCdeadtime"df
D1E httBCC%%%"lbl"go!CabcC%allchartCchatersC+8C8"html
D+0E httBCC%%%"astro"su"eduCusersCnielCastro9M5Cderi!ationsCgeiger+"df
K