1997 Volume 46 Issue 1 Pages 28-32
A proportional counter has been designed to detect soft X-rays in energy-dispersive X-ray fluorescence (EDXRF) analysis of elements having a medium atomic number.
The counter consists of a 25 mm diameter cylindrical cathode with an entrance window of a thin Mylar film and a 50μm diameter anode wire, it was filled with PR gas at 1 atm using by a gas flow system. The maximum gas multiplication of the counter is over 4×104 at 2000 V of the applied voltage and the energy resolution for X-ray is between 17% and 35% in the energy range between 5.9 ke V and 1.5 ke V.
The counter exceeds PIN photo-diode Si detector (AMPTEK's type XR-100) in detection efficiency under 15 keV of the X-ray energy.
