The activity of the liquid and of the solid was measured separately in

the 4-pi gamma high-pressure ionization chamber.” The decay was

plotted on appropriate log-log paper. The ionization chamber utilized
argon gas under a pressure of 600 psi; the ionization current was
impressed across a high resistance. The resulting voltage was measured
with a vibrating reed electrometer.’? Its calibration with respect to
energy and linearity agreed closely with published values,

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The data have been summarized in Table 1 and the exponent values,
k, computed for the decay equation. The observed decay curves are
plotted in Figs. 3 through 8.
It has been noted* that these data are within a few percent of the gamma
decay curves calculated from radiochemical analysis. The values of k
for all the samples except two were greater than l.2.
The range and’magnitude of the exponents are greater than those
reported from Operation TEAPOT.? The exponent values derived from
the fallout collected at Operation TEAPOT ranged from 0.9 to 1.3 while
the values from CASTLE ranged from 1.1 to 2.03. It is interesting to
note that beta decay measurements made on rain water collected at
Harvard University‘ after Operation CASTLE gave exponents of the same
order of magnitude as those reported here,

Approved by:

E.R. TOMPKINS
Head, Chemical

Technology Division
For the Scientific Director

* Personal communication from C.F. Miller of this laboratory.
-3.-

UNCLASSIFIED

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