CALCULATION OF RANGE AND ENERGY-LOSS OF FAST IONS WITH Z-GREATER-THAN-OR-EQUAL-TO-30 USING A CORRECTED BETHE-BLOCH FORMULA

The classical Bethe-Bloch formula is not fully applicable to fast ions with Z greater than or equal to 30 due to the assumptions and approxi mations utilized in its deduction. Several corrections have been intro duced in the Bethe-Bloch equation in order to extend the equation appl icability to a wider range of ion charges and energies, 4 computer cod e that allows calculation of analytical ranges and energy losses of an y fast heavy ion passing through any dielectric absorber, has been dev eloped. A study of the behaviour of the different corrections introduc ed in the Bethe-Bloch formula has been performed using this code. Rang e results calculated with the program have been compared with experime ntal measurements of ranges of several ions with Z greater than or equ al to 30 of kinetic energy about 1 GeV/amu using etched track detector s exposed at the Berkeley Bevalac. It was found that discrepancies bet ween the measured and our calculated ranges are of the order of 8%, wh ereas if the classical Bethe-Bloch expression is used these discrepanc ies are about 12%.