How easy is it to ionize Nitrogen or oxygen with beta rays?

[joknhial]

Hello, over the past few days I've been looking at glowing ionization tubes on YouTube. there seems to be this innate correlation and association between ionization chambers and noble gasses, like xenon, argon and neon. i was wondering is it possible for oxygen or nitrogen to glow like them ?, both in a closed environment (tube), and in the open?. The only plausible explanation i can think of is that oxygen and nitrogen become unstable when stripped of electrons and will therefore quickly react with other nitrogen or oxygen atoms to regain that stable configuration. however is it possible to ionize them and maintain that glowing excited state? which are commonly seen in auroras. if so how much power is required, in terms of Mev or Ev classification?

 

[gleem]

yes.

 

[rootone]

Ionized Oxygen would be aggresively reactive with just about anything except noble gases.
Probably the tube electrodes either a metal/alloy or Carbon would oxidise and break down quickly.
Possibly even the glass tube could break down eventually even if given a durable electrode material.

 

[Astronuc]

Oxygen would indeed react with the metal electrodes, but air is apparently common in ionization chambers. Normally ionization detectors contain argon, although some might contain air if they are for low activities. Some ionization chambers may be open to the air/atmosphere, while others are sealed in which case they like contain gases like Ar.

I remember using Ar or Ar-CH₄ (so-called P10 gas) and BF₃ detectors, with the latter being sensitive to neutrons.

Some examples of Ar-filled detectors.
http://www.orau.org/ptp/collection/ionchamber/carmichaelhipressure.htm
http://www.orau.org/ptp/collection/ionchamber/RS 111 Prototype.htm

This document gives some insight into gas-filled radiation detectors, including ionization chambers, GM and proportional counters, and fill gases.
https://www.science.mcmaster.ca/medphys/images/files/courses/4R06/4R6Notes3_GasFilled_Detectors.pdf
See 3.2 Proportional counters - the last 2 pages of Section B.

A problem with some fill gases is that photons can be created by gas de-excitation. Gas
multiplication is based on secondary ionization. In addition, however, collisions may
occur where the gas molecule is raised to an excited state but not ionized, so secondary
electrons are not created. There is no contribution of this molecule to the avalanche; it
decays by photon emission. The photons can create ionization elsewhere in the fill gas by
interacting with less tightly bound electrons or interacting by the photoelectric effect in
the counter wall. In proportional counters this creates spurious pulses and/or loss of
proportionality. To reduce this effect QUENCH gases are added. These are polyatomic
gases that will preferentially absorb the photons. Often this quench gas is methane.

The type of fill gas used is dependent on the function the counter is to perform.
Commonly used gases for β measurements are the noble gases. These often require a
quench gas however. Cost dictates that argon is commonly used, usually as a mixture of
90% argon with 10% methane. This is called P-10 gas. For better γ-ray detection the fill
gas is switched to krypton or xenon.