The principle and the present status of the thermoluminescent (TL) dating are reviewed. The method is still in research stage.
There exist a number of problems to be solved concerning various factors affecting TL light output. Among them, the effect of radiation quality (sometimes called the LET effect), non-linearity of the relation between the light output and the absorbed dose, fading of TL during burial or storage, bleaching of TL by irradiation of light, the pressure effect, the effect of grinding of the sample, the effect of oxygen atmosphere during TL measurement, change of the susceptibility by initial heating, inhomogeneity in the sample structure, the radioactive disequilibrium in uranium series, and the effect of temperature gradient in the sample during heating are mentioned and possible solutions are described.
