ABSTRACT
Thermoluminescent dosimetry (TLD) is used in many scientific and applied fields such as radiation protection, radiotherapy clinic, industry, and environmental and space research, using many different materials. The basic demands of a TLD are good reproducibility, low hygroscopicity, and high sensitivity for very low dose measurements or good response at high doses in radiotherapy and in mixed radiation fields. TLDs are relative dosimeters and therefore have to be calibrated against absolute dosimetry systems such as a calibrated ion chamber. Due to the small size, TLDs are convenient for dose-distribution measurements in medicine and biology. The use of TLDs in electron-beam dosimetry is inherently more complicated than its use in photon dosimetry since, for each incident electron beam energy, one obtains a different dose response. TLD is a relative method; that is, it is necessary to initially calibrate the detector in a known radiation field, usually a Co source.
