Abstract
A wide variety of inorganic and organic substances luminesce under the effect of X rays or radiation from radioactive sources; these substances include proteins, nucleic acids, and their components. Reports on the radioluminescence of DNA will be found in monographs by Tarusov (1955) and Dubinin (1961). Sapezhinskii and Emanuel’ (1960) recorded an after-emission of proteins and nucleic acids under the action of γ rays. Zommermayer et al. (1961) observed luminescence from aqueous solutions of aromatic amino acids exposed to soft (7 keV) X rays. An analogous luminescence from crystalline and dissolved tryptophan under more severe conditions of excitation (60 keV) was investigated by Barenboim and Domanskii (1963). Augenstein et al (1964b) and Carter et al (1965) studied the X-ray luminescence of powders of aromatic amino acids and proteins.
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Since radiation excites luminescence from the surface and X ray from the whole bulk of the powder, the conditions of reflection and light scattering of the luminescence are different in the two forms of excitation. This difference may account for the observed spectral shift, since in Chizhikova’s work (1961) different conditions of multiple reflection and light scattering of the luminescence resulted in an apparent displacement of the spectrum.
Determination of the energy yield by the method selected by Augenstein and co-workers requires measurement of the absorbed dose of the incident radiation and absolute photometric measurement of the intensity of the emitted light. It is known that luminescence yields obtained for powders are not in fact true quantum yields because in powders the unavoidable multiple reflections and scattering leads to reabsorption of the luminescence. This has been demonstrated experimentally, e.g., by Chizhikova (1961) by comparison of data for powders and crystals. Therefore the usual procedure is to use special measurements and calculations for powders [Alentsev and Vinokurov (1951)], whose application in the case of radioluminescence is hindered by the fact that the penetrating radiation excites emission from the whole mass of the powder.
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Barenboim, G.M., Domanskii, A.N., Turoverov, K.K. (1969). Radioluminescence of Biopolymers and Their Components. In: Luminescence of Biopolymers and Cells. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-6441-0_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-6441-0_4
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
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