Covariance analysis of irradiation process in k0 NAA methodology

Full text: The use of k0 for quantitative reactor neutron-activation analysis (NAA) is a well known method for determination of multi-elemental concentrations in different materials. The general formula that yields the concentration value can be divided in two parts: one involving detection parameters and the other involving irradiation parameters. The rigorous uncertainty calculation must take into account the correlations between each of these parameters. The present work describes a methodology applying covariance analysis to obtain the overall uncertainty in the concentrations of different elements in a given sample and the correlation between each pair of them. The present paper concentrates in selected parameters from the irradiation process using experimental data obtained in the IEA-R1 research reactor. (author)