EPR study of table sugar rod and powder as high dose dosimeters K. Marzougui a, * , Y.S. Soliman b , K. Farah a, c , A. Mansor b , A.H. Hamzaoui d , N. Ben Nessib e, f , F. Abde-Rehim b a Unité de Recherche: Maîtrise et Développement des Techniques Nucléaires à Caractère Pacifique, Centre National des Sciences et Technologie Nucléaires, Route de Sidi thabet, 2020 Sidi-Thabet, Tunisia b Egyptian High-Dose Dosimetry Reference Laboratory, National Center for Radiation Research and Technology, AEA, P.O. Box 29, Nasr City, Cairo, Egypt c ISTLS, 12, rue Abdallah Ibn Zoubeir, 4029, Université de Sousse, Tunisia d Laboratoire de valorisation des ressources naturelles et matériaux de récupération, Centre National de recherche en Sciences des Matériau, Technopôle de Borj Cédria B.P. 95, Hammam-Lif 2050, Tunisia e Groupe de Recherche en Physique Atomique et Astrophysique, Institut National des Sciences Appliquées et de Technologie, Université de Carthage, Tunisia f Department of Physics and Astronomy, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2455, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia highlights < We investigated the EPR dosimetric properties of g-irradiated sucrose solid state. < We compared the accuracy of rod and powder form. < We studied temperature irradiation effect, fading, and repeatability. article info Article history: Received 9 July 2011 Received in revised form 22 August 2012 Accepted 24 August 2012 Keywords: EPR Sugar rod dosimeter g-irradiation abstract In order to improve the ease of sample handling, the reproducibility of signal detection and quantifi- cation, simple methods of incorporating a homogeneous mixture containing sugar powder (30%) with wax (35%) and rubber (35%) into rods has been adopted. The dose response, the time stability of the free radicals produced in table sugar dosimeters (in both rod and powder form) by gamma radiation and the effect of the temperature during irradiation were studied by EPR (Electron Paramagnetic Resonance). The peak-to-peak height (PPH) measurement of the EPR signal is studied as a function of the absorbed gamma dose in the range 0.1e58 kGy. For the two forms, a linear dependency is found between 0.1 and 26 kGy. At higher doses the EPR signal amplitude continues to grow but non-linear up to 58 kGy. The dependence of temperature during irradiation has been investigated in the temperature range 25e40  C and the calculated correction coefficients were found (2.7  0.2)%  C 1 and (1.5  0.3)%  C 1 , respectively, for powder and rod forms. The time stability of the stored sugar samples was investigated for 34 days at room temperature, a rapid decrease of EPR signal was showed immediately after irradiation followed by slowly decrease. Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Sucrose was found as a very promising radiation sensitive material (RSM) for gamma-irradiation (Nakajima and Otsuki, 1990; Yordanov and Georgieva, 2004; Karakirova et al., 2010, 2008), since it induced relatively stable free radicals, that upon dissolution of the solid state, free radicals interact in the solution to allow the formation of diacid that was studied in our previous work with pH_metry (Hamzaoui et al., 2009). Besides, it was recently found that sucrose may be used for dosimetric purposes using electrical conductivity that showed linearity until 300 kGy (Marzougui et al., 2008). Several other studies have been evaluated sucrose for dosimetry to measure high doses via measuring the optical density and EPR intensity as a function of radiation dose (Yordanov and Karakirova, 2007a, 2007b; Yordanov et al., 2002; Karakirova et al., 2008; Mikou et al., 2009). Nevertheless there are a few studies of EPR properties of irradiated sugars, which deal with the effect of the shape and size of dosimeters, but using only cylindrical pellet shape (Desrosiers and Wadley, 2005; Yordanov et al., 2006). Since high-dose dosimeters are sensitive to environmental factors, the irradiation temperature mustn’t be neglected. And despite the influence of irradiation temperature on accuracy and precision of dosimeter (Desrosiers et al., 2009), this effect on sucrose still hasn’t been investigated in previous studies. * Corresponding author. Tel.: þ216 21286312. E-mail address: kaouther.marzougui@topnet.tn (K. Marzougui). Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Radiation Measurements journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/radmeas 1350-4487/$ e see front matter Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.radmeas.2012.08.007 Radiation Measurements xxx (2012) 1e4 Please cite this article in press as: Marzougui, K., et al., EPR study of table sugar rod and powder as high dose dosimeters, Radiation Measurements (2012), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.radmeas.2012.08.007