Proton Forward Elastic Scattering Analysis for Measuring Hydrogen Concentrations of Aerosol

Proton elastic scattering analysis(PESA) method was employed to measure H concentrations of aerosol samples on nuclear track filter. With 2.5 MeV proton beam and 40 degree scattering angle, the detection limit of PESA is 0.36 μg/cm² for aerosol samples on 10 μm nuclear track filters. The PESA results show that H concentrations of these aerosol samples are from 3.2 to 37.5 μg/cm², much higher than the detection limit of PESA. The measured scattering cross sections of proton from H vary within ±3% in the range of 1.0-2.5 MeV, so a single standard sample can be used for samples with different thicknesses.