Back to results
US 3,946,231 AGranted
Liquid scintillation counting system with automatic gain correction
AssigneeG. D. Searle & Co.
InventorRichard B. Frank
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Automatic liquid scintillation counting apparatus including a scintillating medium in the elevator ram of the sample changing apparatus. An appropriate source of radiation, which may be the external source for standardizing samples, produces reference scintillations in the scintillating medium which may be used for correction of the gain of the counting system.
Claims9
In an automatic liquid scintillation counting system,
- conveyor means for delivering a plurality of liquid scintillation samples to a sample transfer station;
- shielding means positioned adjacent same sample transfer station and defining a counting chamber spaced from said station and a passageway interconnecting said station and said chamber;
- transducer means associated with said counting chamber for converting scintillations within said chamber into electrical pulses corresponding in amplitude to the intensities of said scintillations;
- sample transfer means operatively associated with said counting chamber and said passageway and including an elevator ram adapted to traverse said counting chamber and said passageway for transporting said samples between said sample transfer station and said chamber;
- scintillation means operatively associated with said sample transfer means for automatically producing reference scintillations in said counting chamber when said samples are positioned outside said chamber by said sample transfer means and including a body of scintillating phosphor mounted in said elevator ram in a position such that said body is exposed to said transducer means in said counting chamber when an upper portion of said elevator ram is positioned within said passageway;
- and
- circuit means operatively associated with said transducer means for automatically adjusting the gain of said counting system in accordance with said reference scintillations.
4 more elements
In an automatic liquid scintillation counting system,
- conveyor means for delivering a plurality of liquid scintillation samples to a sample transfer station;
- shielding means positioned adjacent said sample transfer station and defining a counting chamber spaced from said station and a passageway interconnecting said station and said chamber;
- transducer means associated with said counting chamber for converting scintillations therein having a spectrum of intensities into electrical pulses having a spectrum of amplitudes directly corresponding to said spectrum of intensities in accordance with the gain value of said transducer means;
- sample transfer means for transporting said samples between said sample transfer station and said counting chamber, including an elevator ram traversing said chamber and said passageway;
- said elevator ram having a platform on the top thereof on which said samples ride and having a solid scintillation crystal mounted therein at a location beneath said platform such that said crystal is positioned within said chamber when a sample on said platform is without said chamber;
- and
- means for alternatively exposing said samples and said crystal to a source of penetrating reference radiations when said samples and said crystal are within said sample counting chamber to produce efficiency-correction scintillations in said samples and reference scintillations in said crystal.
4 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.