Characterization of low power research reactor neutrons for the validation of k0-INAA standardization based on k0-IAEA software

• We characterized the irradiation site of Ghana Research Reactor-1 (GHARR-1) for k0-INAA application.
• Both bare and Cd-ratio method were used for the characterization.
• α, f and thermal, epithermal and fast neutron flux values were found to agree largely with earlier reports.
• We developed an irradiation method to detect and quantify up to 32 elements in plants, rock and lake sediment matrices.
• The z-score analysis showed 90% of the data points within the range of |z|<2.

Channel Bsite2 of Ghana research reactor-1 has been characterized for k0-INAA application. Cadmium ratio and bare multi-monitor were used to determine flux parameters using 0.1%Au–Al, Fe, and Zr wire as flux monitors. The parameters determined were 18.36±1.91, 0.0479±0.012, 5.12×1011±0.42×1011 ncm−2 s−1, 2.74×1010±0.14×1010 ncm−2 s−1, 7.73×1010±0.16×1010 ncm−2 s−1 and 16.75±1.58, −0.034±0.0028, 4.28×1011±1.71×1011 ncm−2 s−1, 2.55×1010±0.15×1010 ncm−2 s−1 respectively for thermal-to-epithermal flux ratio, alpha, thermal neutron, epithermal neutron and fast neutron flux using cadmium ratio and multi-monitor method accordingly. The k0-INAA performance assessment based on z  -score distributions showed most results within |z|<2|z|<2.