Thermoluminescence characteristics of the irradiated minerals extracted from red pepper (Capsicum annuum L.) spice

J. MARCAZZÓ; E.CRUZ-ZARAGOZA; L. MONTIEL; M. BARBOZA-FLORES

Congreso; VII International Symposium on Radiation Physics; 2011

The thermoluminescence (TL) emission of inorganic polymineral content in the foodstuffs allows us to analyze the main TL characteristics that may be useful in the identification of irradiated food. In this work, the mineral fraction was separated from commercial Mexican red pepper (Capsicum annuum) and according to the X-ray diffraction, the mineralogical composition was mainly quartz. From the polymineral fraction of different grain sizes, samples of 149 µm were selected because the highest TL signals. The samples were irradiated from 1 to 120 Gy by using a 60-Co irradiator. The TL characteristics like glow curve shape, dose-response, UV and sunlight bleaching and fading were analyzed. Because the complex structure of the glow curves, the Tm-Tstop method was used to determinate the peaks number and, the kinetics parameters were calculated by using a computerized deconvolution program assuming general order kinetics model (GOK).