Performance comparison of a new approach to nuclear spectral analysis withcommercial codes

The performance of a new approach to nuclear spectral analysis was compared with two widely accepted Commercial codes. The comparison measured the new approach's ability to determine the presence and activity of multiple nucl ides in spectra dominated by natural background. The new approach is implem ented in the spectral analysis software, RobWin(TM). Ten calibration sources ranging in activity from 25 to 450 kBq were placed 20.5 meters from a bare, 100% relative efficient high purity germanium gamm a-ray detector, thus assuring dominance of the natural background radiation over the test nuclides. Accumulated spectra were recorded at ever-doubling time intervals from 225 seconds to 128 hours. All spectra were analyzed by each code according to a defined procedure designed to achieve the best re sults from the:comparator codes. The results from all codes were in general agreement for most nuclides where acquisition times were-long, but RobWin' s performance was significantly superior-for short counting times.