Warning: errors detected
I have subsequently discovered there were faults in the data transfer utility that extracted data from the ENSDF tables. Thus not all the data from the ENSDF files were converted over in this version.
On WinXP, sometimes the display will show in a very small font.
Also an error, such as ???RichEdit line insertion error???, occurs. I develop with Windows 98, thus I believe it is a problem with an updated ???riched32.dll??? in Windows XP. Thus I will need to (when I get the time), look into and try and correct these above problems.
Update 19/2/2007: I have verified that there was only limited problems with the data transfer. The main problem is the ENSDF files themselves had missing data!. I will thus need to find a source that has ???correct??? ENSDF files that I can utilise!
Introduction
???Radiation Decay??? (RadDecay) provides radioactive decay information for more than 3000 radionuclides, (3713 to be exact). Data provided include: The elements physical properties (like density, melting point, and specific heat), and the elements radionuclides and nuclides data (such as half life, daughter nuclides, decay chain series, probabilities per decay, and decay product energies for alphas, betas, gammas, and X-rays).
The radioactive elements can be searched, to find an element that emits a particular Alpha, Beta, or Photon emission. For example, say a photon spectrum gives two photon peaks at 150 keV and 420 keV. The radio active elements can be searched for photons that give a 150 keV, then the previously found elements can be searched for the 420 keV photon. Hence Photon spectrums can be matched to photon emitters.
The radionuclide can be selected from an Alphabetical list, or selected from a Periodic Table. The radionuclides can be graphed in the decay chain series, and in the nuclide abundance table. Also a decay (half life) calculation can be performed, and the resulting activities can be graphed. Full coping to clipboard and output to printer is supported.
Version 4 ??? update information
As confirmed by the many emails I had received, (regarding the incompatibility of the older versions (1,2 and 3) with current Windows 32 bit environments (Win XP)) this update has (no doubt) been long overdue.
I had stopped work on updating the old 16 bit MS-Windows version (version 3.6 being the last update to the 16 bit code), and (eventually) started work on this totally new MS-Windows 32 bit Version. I have now (finally) completed this functional (relatively), full-featured 32 bit version, that is worthy of being a replacement for the past 16 bit versions.
Raddecay history
This program was initially a MS-Windows duplicate of the Shareware DOS program raddecay.exe.
The initial Shareware DOS program was written by Grove Engineering, Inc., and utilised the Radioactive Decay Data Tables by David C. Kocher (published in 1981) which provided radiation decay information for 497 radionuclides.
My original MS-Windows developed version (version 1) also utilised the ???Radioactive decay data tables by David C. Kocher???, and thus originally had the same capability of the Shareware DOS program. The capabilities of my developed RadDecay program increased with the later versions (version 2 and 3). These later versions had many enhanced capabilities to the original DOS application. However, these applications were still a 16 bit Windows (Win3.1) application, and thus had compatibility issues with current 32 bit Windows (like Win 2000 and XP).
The previous version (1,2, and 3) also had limited nuclides data, being based on 497 radionuclides of the ???Kocher??? tables.
This latest version (Version 4), is a total rewrite of the older versions, with enhanced capabilities (i.e more graphical functions), and is a full 32 bit windows (XP compatible) application. However the most significant update, and enhanced capability, is that ???RadDecay??? now utilises the enhanced and expanded ENSDF data files (see below). These data files provide much more radionuclides (over 3000 compared to 479 of the Kocher tables), and much more data (such as spectrums) for all radionuclides.
Nuclide reference source
All nuclide data was extracted from the ???Evaluated Nuclear Structure Data File???, National Nuclear Data Center, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY 11973-5000
The ENSDF data files were retrieved from the Web site of NNDC Online Data Service
The ENSDF text based files were re-formatted to Borland Delphi records, for use in this RadDecay application.
Freeware information
This program and data files are freeware, hence the Authors* give permission for making copies of this program, and using the data files contained within, ???Without Restriction???, (subject to the No-Liability clause).
Due to legal concerns, the user must accept a licence, and no-liability clause, which will display the first time the application is run.
The program code (RadDecay.exe) is my work, yet the data files (*.REC) are derived from outside sources, (ENSDF web site and literature sources).
The Nuclides data (Alphas.rec, Betas.rec, Daughter.rec, Gammas.rec, Nuclide.rec, and Xrays.rec) were direct translations of the ENSDF text data files. The authors of the ENSDF data files have given permission for utilising the data files, with the requirement for acknowledging the source of the data.
The ENSDF Web site (see above) contains information on the public status of the ENSDF data, and in addition email confirmation has been received (from Mr J. K. Tuli, Brookhaven National Laboratory) that this RadDecay application is permitted to download and utilise the ENSDF data, (and requested that the source of the data be acknowledged).
Note: this version of RadDecay (Version 4) would be still be considered in beta testing stage.