Characteristic limits of 230Th in alpha spectrometry with 229Th as tracer, calculated by simulating interfering tails and overlapping peaks.

This study explores the effect of 229Th tracer tail interference on the determination of the sensitivity of 230Th alpha spectrometry of samples with environmental levels of radioactivity. Tracer peak tail interference was calculated with Suma-Alpha, whilst Visual Basic for Applications (VBA in Excel©) software was used to study the variation in sensitivity in terms of the amount of tracer added. Unnecessary increases in the amount of tracer or extended sample measuring times were observed to have adverse effects on method sensitivity (Detection Limit- Ld).