This program was developed by Katelyn Watts, under supervision and guidance from Dr. Roger Caballero-Folch, at and for TRIUMF: Canada's Particle Acceleration Centre.
This is a short program where users provide a nuclide that undergoes ß- decay and can emit neutrons in that process. The user receives a csv file containing all the possible decay chains, the half-lives of the nuclides in each step of the chain, and the probability of each step.
Before installing, make sure you have Python 3.6 or later installed. For information and installation, see https://www.python.org/downloads/.
There are two options for installation of this program.
- Cloning this Repository (RECOMMENDED)
- From the console, navigate to the directory where you want the program
- Enter
git clone https://github.com/kwatts-4/beta-decay-chains
- Downloading the Program
- Go to https://github.com/kwatts-4/beta-decay-chains
- Click code (the green button)
- Click Download ZIP
- Unzip the file and move the directory into a directory of your choice
From the console, navigate to the directory called beta-decay-chains. If you downloaded the zip file rather than cloning the repository, the directory will be called beta-decay-chains-main.
Once there, enter the command python chain_generator/interface.py. This will launch the program.
The program launches with a tkinter interface. The user is prompted to enter a nuclide that undergoes ß- decay as well as a path for the csv. The csv is written to a file called Decay_Chain_[nuclide].csv in the user-specified directory. If no directory is specified, the default is the current directory.
There are also two checkboxes. When the first is selected, the program will print the decay chains to the console as rows of Python lists. When the second is selected, the program will fill in empty values in the csv with the string or float "-2.0", to enable the csv files to be used in the ROOT framework. ROOT expects the csv to have rows of equal length. The reason for choosing -2.0 instead of a string like "Empty" is to make the resulting csv more malleable, allowing the values in each column to have a consistent type. Anything to make C/C++ happy...
To run the program multiple times, enter another nuclide, change the filepath if you'd like, and hit Generate Chains. To close the program, close the tkinter window.
Sample Inputs:
88As
./98Rb
~/Downloads/User-Specified/Path/The csv file structure is very basic. The entered nuclide is listed in the first column of each row, followed by its half-life in seconds, then its probability of either emitting zero, one, or two neutrons. This is followed by the next nuclide in the chain, its half-life, and its probability of producing the third nuclide in the chain. The chain terminates once a stable nuclide is reached. Since the last nuclide in each chain is stable, its half-life ('STABLE' or a half-life above 1e+18) is not followed by a probability value. Since some chains will be shorter than others, some rows will have a few blank elements.
There are some probability values that are to be treated as flags, and have special meanings. In both cases, the nuclide's P1n or P2n value is unknown, but the specified number of neutron emissions is known to occur.
| Value | Meaning |
|---|---|
| -1.0/-1 | The nuclide's Qß1n or Qß2n value is extremely large and has not been measured. |
| 0.001 | The nuclide's Qß1n or Qß2n value is less than 1000 MeV and has not been accurately measured. |
More sample csv files may be found in the sample_csv directory.
Sample Output (csv file):
888As,0.20,-1.000,88Se,1.51,99.010,88Br,16.29,93.280,88Kr,10170,100.000,88Rb,1066.38,100.000,88Sr,STABLE
88As,0.20,-1.000,87Se,5.65,99.400,87Br,55.64,97.470,87Kr,4578,100.000,87Rb,1.56841E+18,,,
88As,0.20,-1.000,86Se,14.1,99.999,86Br,55.1,100.000,86Kr,STABLE,,,,,,
88As,0.20,-1.000,88Se,1.51,0.990,87Br,55.64,97.470,87Kr,4578,100.000,87Rb,1.56841E+18,,,
88As,0.20,-1.000,87Se,5.65,0.600,86Br,55.1,100.000,86Kr,STABLE,,,,,,
88As,0.20,-1.000,86Se,14.1,0.001,85Br,174,100.000,85Kr,338897066.4,100.000,85Rb,STABLE,,,
88As,0.20,-1.000,88Se,1.51,99.010,88Br,16.29,6.720,87Kr,4578,100.000,87Rb,1.56841E+18,,,
88As,0.20,-1.000,87Se,5.65,99.400,87Br,55.64,2.530,86Kr,STABLE,,,,,,
88As,0.20,-1.000,88Se,1.51,0.990,87Br,55.64,2.530,86Kr,STABLE,,,,,,Sample Output (csv file with filled null values)
888As,0.20,-1.000,88Se,1.51,99.010,88Br,16.29,93.280,88Kr,10170,100.000,88Rb,1066.38,100.000,88Sr,STABLE
88As,0.20,-1.000,87Se,5.65,99.400,87Br,55.64,97.470,87Kr,4578,100.000,87Rb,1.56841E+18,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0
88As,0.20,-1.000,86Se,14.1,99.999,86Br,55.1,100.000,86Kr,STABLE,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0
88As,0.20,-1.000,88Se,1.51,0.990,87Br,55.64,97.470,87Kr,4578,100.000,87Rb,1.56841E+18,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0
88As,0.20,-1.000,87Se,5.65,0.600,86Br,55.1,100.000,86Kr,STABLE,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0
88As,0.20,-1.000,86Se,14.1,0.001,85Br,174,100.000,85Kr,338897066.4,100.000,85Rb,STABLE,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0
88As,0.20,-1.000,88Se,1.51,99.010,88Br,16.29,6.720,87Kr,4578,100.000,87Rb,1.56841E+18,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0
88As,0.20,-1.000,87Se,5.65,99.400,87Br,55.64,2.530,86Kr,STABLE,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0
88As,0.20,-1.000,88Se,1.51,0.990,87Br,55.64,2.530,86Kr,STABLE,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0,-2.0Sample Output (printed to console if print box checked):
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '88Se', '1.51', 99.01, '88Br', '16.29', 93.28, '88Kr', '10170', 100, '88Rb', '1066.38', 100, '88Sr', 'STABLE']
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '87Se', '5.65', 99.4, '87Br', '55.64', 97.47, '87Kr', '4578', 100, '87Rb', '1.56841E+18']
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '86Se', '14.1', 99.999, '86Br', '55.1', 100, '86Kr', 'STABLE']
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '88Se', '1.51', 0.99, '87Br', '55.64', 97.47, '87Kr', '4578', 100, '87Rb', '1.56841E+18']
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '87Se', '5.65', 0.6, '86Br', '55.1', 100, '86Kr', 'STABLE']
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '86Se', '14.1', 0.001, '85Br', '174', 100, '85Kr', '338897066.4', 100, '85Rb', 'STABLE']
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '88Se', '1.51', 99.01, '88Br', '16.29', 6.72, '87Kr', '4578', 100, '87Rb', '1.56841E+18']
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '87Se', '5.65', 99.4, '87Br', '55.64', 2.53, '86Kr', 'STABLE']
['88As', '0.20', -1.0, '88Se', '1.51', 0.99, '87Br', '55.64', 2.53, '86Kr', 'STABLE']