Digital risetime discrimination for peak enhancement in gas proportional scintillation counter x-ray fluorescence analysis

A digital pulse processing technique aas developed for a gas proportional scintillation counter to improve the detector performance for energy-dispersive x-ray spectrometric applications. The technique uses a digital pulse-height analyser to access simultaneously the rise time and peak amplitude of each individual pulse. Pulses from x-ray interactions occurring in the scintillation region and near the detector dead regions, Both contributing to the spectral background, are rejected by digital pule risetime discrimination. ban the basis of the digitally measured risetime, the x-rag pulse-height distribution is improved through peak enhancement and background reduction. Results concerning x-say fluorescence spectra are presented showing an improvement in the limit of detection fag a factor of two. (C) 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.