Beta Calculations Are Here in Freeware!

[raymcginnis]

In previous posts, I promised beta calculations by this Summer.  They are here and available now, a full 20 days ahead of schedule.  There are also new enhancements to the gamma emitter calculations.  For all who are not already on the mailing list, below is the mailing that I just sent out (to join the Rad Pro Calculator mailing list, go to http://www.radprocalculator.com/Request.aspx, fill in name, email address and under comments type in "Join mailing list").  Here are the details of version 2.10:
_____________________________________________________________________

Greetings to all Rad Pro Calculator Users!



I just finished testing version 2.10 of Rad Pro Calculator and it is available for download to all now at: http://www.radprocalculator.com/RadProDownloads.aspx



Here are the major additions:



Beta Dose-Rate and Activity Equations



The gamma emitter calculations are very popular and I received many requests to add beta emitter equations, especially from university, radiochemical lab and researchers.  This version includes those.  The isotope list is of the most popular requests and most commonly seen beta emitters for now.  This list will grow as the requests come in (all you have to do is contact me and ask at http://www.radprocalculator.com/Request.aspx). 



You may calculate both directions (known activity, calculate dose-rate and known dose-rate, calculate activity).  I gave you the choice of fluence rate equations or extrapolation table data from the 1998 Rad Health Handbook.  I have no way of checking these calculations, so I am depending on you to report back to me.  If you requested these calculations, please contact me and tell me which numbers are true to life in the real world for you, so I can report it to others.  The Rad Health Handbook extrapolation option gives you another option for plane source, if you have a spill, and then the backscatter option appears for the contaminated surface material.  I did have one case of empirical data to compare it to here at my day job.  We had a legacy spill in a former spent fuel storage vault, predominately Cs-137.  I knew dpm/100cm2 and converted it to mCi/cm2 and ran the plane source numbers.  The software predicted 950 mrad/hr.  Real life measurement was 770 mrad/hr, using a depleted uranium slab calibration correction factor (not too bad, I say).  Sometimes the numbers between fluence-rate and extrapolation are real close and sometimes they vary up to a factor of 2.5.  Please share your Rad Pro Calculator beta calculation experience with the rest of the nuclear community by contacting me.



I also did add calculations for low energy beta emitters such as tritium (H-3), even though I hemmed and hawed about them not being measurable when users first made requests.  I guess the numbers could be useful in research and they were doable, so I put them on the list.



Gamma Shielding and Dose-Rate



The calculations were enhanced by adding attenuation due to air.  This is especially important for low energy isotopes like Am-241 and Pb-210.  I also tackled something I have not seen in other shielding programs, calculating shield thickness given starting dose-rate and desired dose-rate.  This was especially tricky when turning on the buildup factor check box.  You are solving for thickness, but the buildup factor, which is a variable in the equation, varies with thickness.  To make it more complex, for multi-energy isotopes, each energy has its own buildup factor which varies with thickness.  How do you solve for that thickness?  It takes a computer, that is how.  It is a pretty neat tool.



User Interface Change



To allow for future growth, like types of equations were sub-grouped in a new sub-tab configuration.  If you click on the "Exposure Rate" tab, you get the gamma and shielding, new beta and inverse square law equations in a sub-tab categorization.  Click on the "Conversion" tab and you get all of the conversion equations.  I also made it very clear now which tab is for gamma emitters and which is for beta emitters.



Note:  If you are still using version 1.XX, you must uninstall that version and use a new install package to get all of the new features of 2.10!





If you find any bugs or have any requests or comments, feel free to contact me at http://www.radprocalculator.com/Request.aspx



Which file to download is explained at: http://www.radprocalculator.com/RadProDownloads.aspx

[Rennhack]

Thanks RadPro guy, we all appreciate your hard work.