I am going to carrying out an investigation in the lab on gamma ray spectroscopy and to help me understand the graphs that will be displayed to me, I am researching on the types of interactions that happen within the crystal.
As I know so far there a three
- Photoelectric absorption
- Compton Scattering
- Pair Production
The issue I am having is with the photoelectric absorption and how light (optical photons are being generated) , the book I am ref from is 'Radiation Detection and Measurement, G.F Knoll, pg 49-50'. Also the crystal I am using for my experiment is a sodium/Thallium crystal.
So here my understand of how the photoelectric interaction is occurring in the crystal.
As the gamma photo enters the crystal it is 100% absorbed by an atom to which is comes into contact with and a photo electron is ejected, this is normally from the K-shell of the atom, so for my lab the gamma photo should have and energy > than the binding energy of the atom.
So when the photo electron is ejected a gap is left within the K-shell so a surrounding electron the fill it place and a characteristic x-ray is emitted and through phosphorylation and collisions with the photo electron optical light is generated by energy dissipation.
Is this along the correct line to what is actual happening within the crystal with regards to the photoelectric interaction.