BY PGNAA

PROMPT-GAMMA, NEUTRON ACTIVATION ANALYSIS (PGNAA) IS A NEUTRON SOURCE BASED METHOD FOR THE QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OFMULTIPLE ELEMENTS. THE METHOD IS BEING USED FOR PERFORMING CONTINUOUS, ON-LINE ELEMENTAL ANALYSIS OF MATERIAL STREAMS E.G., COAL, ORES, WASTE WATER, TAILINGS, SLURRY FLOWS ETC.) AND PROVIDING QUASI-IMMEDIATE PROCESS CONTROL DATA ON MULTIPLE ELEMENTS IN THE STREAM. A RESEARCH PROGRAM IS PROPOSED TO IDENTIFY AND ASSESS MAJOR DATA DISCREPANCIES ARISING FROM IMPORTANT MATRIX EFFECTS IN THESE MATERIAL STREAMS (E.G., VARYING MOISTURE CONTENT AND STRONG NEUTRON ASORBERS). THESE MATRIX EFECTS CAN ALTER NEUTRON SCATTERING,MODERATION, ABSORPTION PROCESSES AND CAPTURE GAMMA RAY ATTENUATION AND THEREBY SERIOUSLY AFFECT ACCURACY AND RESOLUTION OF THE DATA. HOWEVER, WITH THE PROPER DEVELOPMENTAND APPLICATION OF EXISTING THEORY, COMPUTER CODES, AND NEUTRON CROSS SECTIONAL DATA IT IS PROPOSED THAT AN ADEQUATE, BUT SIMPLE MODEL CAN BE DEVELOPED TO CORRECT THESESIGNIFICANT MATRIX EFFECTS AND ENHANCE APPLICATIONS FOR CONTINUOUS, ON LINE MATERIAL STREAM CONTROL. THIS EFFORT WILL BE ACCOMPLISHED BY A WELL COORDINATED PROGRAM OF ANALYSIS, MODELING, AND EXPERIMENTAL VERIFICATION AND CONFIRMATION TO QUANTITATIVELY ASSESS AND CORRECT FOR IMPORTANT MATRIX EFFECTS IN THE PGNAA APPLICATION TO MATERIAL STREAMS.