Energy dependence of effective atomic numbers for photon energy absorption and photon interaction: Studies of some biological molecules in the energy range 1 keV-20 MeV

Effective atomic numbers for photon energy absorption, Z(PEA,eff), and for photon interaction, Z(PI,eff), have been calculated by a direct method in the photon-energy region from 1 keV to 20 MeV for biological molecules, such as fatty acids (lauric, myristic, palmitic, stearic, oleic, linoleic, linolenic, arachidonic, and arachidic acids), nucleotide bases (adenine, guanine, cytosine, uracil, and thymine), and carbohydrates (glucose, sucrose, raffinose, and starch). The Z(PEA, eff) and Z(PI, eff) values have been found to change with energy and composition of the biological molecules. The energy dependence of the mass attenuation coefficient, Z(PEA, eff), and the mass energy-absorption coefficient, Z(PI, eff), is shown graphically and in tabular form. Significant differences of 17%-38% between Z(PI, eff) and Z(PEA, eff) occur in the energy region 5-100 keV. The reasons for these differences, and for using Z(PEA, eff) rather than Z(PI, eff) in calculations of the absorbed dose, are discussed. (c) 2008 American Association of Physicists in Medicine.