Some sources of error in thermoluminescent dosimetry

A wide variety of effects occurs during the use and evaluation of TL dosemeters causing possible erroneous reading of the absorbed dose. Main errors may be divided into two separate groups - the former being caused by the properties of the dosemeter, and the latter by instabilities of the TL reader. The paper summarizes the sources of error and evaluates some of them for LiF and aluminophosphate glass dosemeters. Instabilities caused by TL reader are closely associated with the method and frequency of calibration. The use of dosemeters irradiated by a known dose is time-consuming and reference light sources are commonly used for the operative control. Parameters of various scintillators used for these sources are discussed and the influence of their temperature dependence on the response is given. (author)