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Detection capabilities: some historical footnotes

and lesser known Currie research

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Abstract

Part I Summary of relevant topics from 1923 to present—including: Currie (Anal Chem 40:586–593, 1968) detection concepts & capabilities; International detection & uncertainty standards; Failure of classical 14C dating and birth of new scientific disciplines; Exploratory nuclear data analysis of 85Kr monitors found coincident with the collapse of the Iron Curtain (1989); Faulty statistics proved responsible for mistaken assertions that Currie’s L C yields excessive false positives; Low-level counting and AMS for atmospheric 37Ar and µmolar fossil/biomass carbon in the environment; Erroneous assumption that our low-level background is a Poisson Process, linked to ~8 % spurious anticoincidence events.

Part II Exact treatment of bivariate Poisson data—solved in 1930s by Przyborowski and Wilenski, Krakow University, for detecting extreme trace amounts of a malicious contaminant (dodder) in high purity seed standards. We adapted their treatment to detection capabilities in ultra-low-level nuclear counting. The timing of their work had great historical significance, marking the start of World War II, with the invasion of Poland (1939).

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Notes

  1. It is a tragedy that, although the physical basis for global warming (greenhouse effect) and the fossil-carbon contribution to the known increase in CO2 (Keeling curve), was known before the mid-to-late twentieth century, it was not acknowledged by those who could take action to control man-made CO2 emissions. The policy makers wanted first to “see” the effects of global warming; by that time it was already too late to prevent it! Even now, there is denial that climate change is occurring (See the Wikipedia article, Climate Change Skepticism and Denial).

  2. In a subsequent re-reading of the footnotes in MARLAP [15], I discovered that they, too, cautioned about the lack of independence: “The common practice of using the same Poisson measurement data for the net signal and its critical value tends to produce a correlation between the two variables” [15, footnote-10]. The fact that MARLAP employed this common practice, however, was not obvious from their mathematical formulation that led to the conclusion that the presumed “Currie” expression (Formula A) was flawed.

  3. The rationale for measuring natural 37Ar in a surface sample is evident from Fig. 3 of Machta’s companion article [18: Section 1:58–68]. The level of northern hemisphere 37Ar contamination during 1971–72 is seen in Fig. 3 of the companion article by H Loosli, et al. [18: Section 1:24–39].

  4. For comparison, thermal diffusion enrichment factors obtained for 37Ar [“Study of natural (cosmic-ray produced) 37Ar in the atmosphere” section, this manuscript] were ~70 [19], and for 14C were up to 260 [23]. The latter was obtained by Libby, using CH4, in his original work in the development of radiocarbon dating (Recent studies continue on ”micro thermal diffusion” for AMS-14C).

  5. Detailed presentation: adapted from the unpublished appendix and Sect. 5.2 of [7].

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Acknowledgments

My former supervisor, the late James R. DeVoe, was responsible for encouragement and “academic freedom” that were critical to my early work on detection capabilities. My colleague, Richard M. Lindstrom, deserves special thanks for his previous coworking and his help with manuscript preparation.

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  1. National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD, 20899, USA

    Lloyd A. Currie

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  1. Lloyd A. Currie
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Correspondence to Lloyd A. Currie.

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Lloyd A. Currie—retired

A special observation from this historical review is the continued importance of fundamental measurements and concepts that may be found in the “ancient” scientific literature. Although technological advances may make the last decade’s results obsolete, basic concepts in Science (and the Humanities) do not age! Nor do the lessons from history (1939, 1989).

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Currie, L.A. Detection capabilities: some historical footnotes. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 311, 1099–1109 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-016-4925-z

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