Non-destructive elemental analysis of a carbonaceous chondrite with direct current Muon beam at MuSIC

Terada, Kentaro*; Sato, Akira*; Ninomiya, Kazuhiko*; Kawashima, Yoshitaka*; Shimomura, Koichiro*; Yoshida, Go*; Kawai, Yosuke*; Osawa, Takahito; Tachibana, Shogo*

Scientific Reports (Internet), 7(1), p.15478_1 - 15478_6, 2017/11

AA2017-0455.pdf:1.15MB

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-15719-5

Electron- or X-ray-induced characteristic X-ray analysis has been widely used to determine chemical compositions of materials in vast research fields. In recent years, analysis of characteristic X-rays from muonic atoms, in which a muon is captured, has attracted attention because both a muon beam and a muon-induced characteristic X-ray have high transmission abilities. Here we report the first non-destructive elemental analysis of a carbonaceous chondrite using one of the world-leading intense direct current muon beam source (MuSIC; MUon Science Innovative Channel). We successfully detected characteristic muonic X-rays of Mg, Si, Fe, O, S and C from Jbilet Winselwan CM chondrite, of which carbon content is about 2 wt percent, and the obtained elemental abundance pattern was consistent with that of CM chondrites.