The Response of Anthracene Scintillation Crystals to High Energyμ-Mesons

Abstract

The response of an anthracene scintillation counter to high energy charged particles which lose only a small fraction of their energy in traversing the crystal was determined, using $\mu$-mesons in the cosmic radiation at sea level with energies from 29 Mev to greater than 1 Bev. The light output was found to have a sizeable fluctuation for mesons of the same initial energy, due to ionization loss straggling. The scintillation efficiency of the phosphor was found to decrease for increasing specific ionization, in agreement with the work of others on electrons and protons. The response of the crystal showed no rise within 2 percent for relativistic meson energies, which agrees with calculations of the density effect reduction in ionization loss for anthracene.