Preliminary experiments: High-energy alpha PIXE in archaeometry

This paper describes the work realized at the Centre Europeen d'Archeometrie to highlight the utility of high-energy alpha PIXE in the particular field of archaeometry and to introduce the developments done and to be clone to complete the knowledge of high-energy alpha PIXE. It starts with the comparison of the yield and the noise background between several alpha particle beams and the comparison between alpha particle and proton beams on different thick and thin references. After, this paper depicts the developments done at the Institut de Physique Nucleaire, Atomique et Spectroscopie to perform such high-energy experiments, first on standards and later on cultural heritage objects. Moreover, it introduces the problematics of such beams for the quantification in PIXE by the intermediary of the knowledge of the ionization and X-ray production cross-sections and also the developments done to answer to this serious lack in the databases. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.