IN SITU PRODUCTION OF ALPHA PARTICLES AND ALPHA RECOIL PARTICLES IN QUARTZ APPLIED TO ESR STUDIES OF OXYGEN VACANCIES

Abstract

The intensity of an ESR signal associated with oxygen vacancies in quartz (E1' center and heat-treated E1' center) are correlated with the radiometric age of their host rocks. Two natural processes are responsible for the production of oxygen vacancies (1) lattice damage along alpha recoil and alpha particle tracks and (2) randomly distributed ionization damage from energetic electrons (beta particles) and gamma photons. The aim of this paper was to determine whether the track damage process is dominant relative to the ionization processes. Heat-treated E1' centers are considered a proxy measure of the oxygen vacancy concentration. In situ alpha irradiation of quartz was accomplished by neutron irradiation of lithium and boron-bearing quartz. We found that the oxygen vacancy population measured by ESR was a factor of 2 higher than estimated from calculations of the damage using Ziegler's TRIM software. Considering the uncertainties in absolute determinations of spin concentration from ESR signals, the agreement is very good and supports the theory that alpha particle damage is largely responsible for oxygen vacancy production during natural irradiation of quartz over intervals of hundreds of millions of years.