A New Natural Gamma Radiation Measurement System for Marine Sediment and Rock Analysis

TL;DR

This paper introduces a high-efficiency, low-background gamma radiation measurement system for marine sediment and rock cores, significantly improving data quality and reliability during offshore geological studies.

Contribution

It presents a novel gamma radiation measurement system with enhanced detectors and shielding, optimized for marine core analysis during drilling expeditions.

Findings

At least ten times higher statistical reliability than previous systems.

Enables reliable core interval correlations at low count rates.

Significantly improves data quality for offshore geological research.

Abstract

A new high-efficiency and low-background system for the measurement of natural gamma radioactivity in marine sediment and rock cores retrieved from beneath the seabed was designed, built, and installed on the JOIDES Resolution research vessel. The system includes eight large NaI(Tl) detectors that measure adjacent intervals of the core simultaneously, maximizing counting times and minimizing statistical error for the limited measurement times available during drilling expeditions. Effect to background ratio is maximized with passive lead shielding, including both ordinary and low-activity lead. Large-area plastic scintillator active shielding filters background associated with the high-energy part of cosmic radiation. The new system has at least an order of magnitude higher statistical reliability and significantly enhances data quality compared to other offshore natural gamma radiation (NGR) systems designed to measure geological core samples. Reliable correlations and interpretations of cored intervals are possible at rates of a few counts per second.