1. Burned with oxygen to form carbon dioxide, or
2. Reduced chemically to methane or ethane, or to a carbide from which acetylene can be evolved by adding water. (See booklet cover and description on [page 59].)
The first technique is the simpler, but carbon dioxide (CO₂) contains only one atom of carbon per molecule, whereas acetylene (C₂H₂) and ethane (C₂H₆) each contain two. Consequently, the [SPECIFIC ACTIVITY] of acetylene or ethane is twice that of carbon dioxide, other things being equal. For that reason acetylene or ethane are the preferred gases in some laboratories. On the other hand, they are explosive, and that cautions other scientists into using the carbon dioxide method.
Whichever gas is used, it is first purified and then stored in a bottle for a month or so. This storage allows for decay (disappearance) of any radon, the gaseous radioactive product of uranium decay. Uranium contamination is difficult to avoid at the low radioactivity levels of ¹⁴C, but the half-life of radon is only 3.82 days, so that it will decay to an insignificant level in a month. After the storage period, the gas is pumped into an array of instruments known as a low-background [PROPORTIONAL COUNTER], and its radioactivity is determined. This is an involved process. First there is the matter of the [BACKGROUND COUNT].
The background count of an instrument is the number of pulses (counts) it will give per unit time when there is no radioactive sample in it. These counts are caused by cosmic rays, by radioactive contamination always found in the vicinity of the counter, or by any contamination inside the instrument. In ¹⁴C counting, all these sources of background must be reduced to negligible levels. This is done in a number of ways.
For one thing, the whole assembly is constructed with surrounding walls of lead or iron more than a foot thick. Such a shield will stop all the [GAMMA RAYS] coming from radioactive contamination in the laboratory and much of the cosmic radiation; high-energy cosmic rays and all neutrons still will get through. Therefore, there is an [ANTICOINCIDENCE RING] inside the lead shield. This is a cylindrical space completely surrounded by [GEIGER COUNTERS] that are connected to each other and to the [SAMPLE COUNTER] in the middle. With this arrangement, when the sample counter and any ring counter discharge simultaneously, it is a signal that the pulse triggering this response was caused by some energetic particles, such as a cosmic ray, passing through the whole assembly. A pulse recorded simultaneously on two counters is automatically rejected from the counting mechanisms. Some instruments have been designed with a cylinder of paraffin immediately inside the anticoincidence ring, to slow down neutrons so that they can be captured, and with a final shield of highly purified mercury between two cylinders of selected steel to hold out even more unwanted radiation.
A carbon-14 counter. Sketch (above) shows arrangement of components in photo (left).
Finally, the sample counters are made of specially selected metal tubing that is extremely low in radioactive content, with a fine wire stretched down the middle. (In some recent designs, the anticoincidence ring and sample counter are combined in a single cylindrical housing with a thin foil of metallized plastic between them.) A thin glass filling tube connects the sample counter with the outside world.
