Gamma-Ray Spectroscopy Using High-Purity Germanium (HPGe) Detectors

This report presents a detailed study of gamma-ray spectroscopy using a High- Purity Germanium (HPGe) detector. The primary objectives were to calibrate the energy scale using known gamma-ray emissions, analyze the precision through residual plots and error bars, and compare the e↵ectiveness of HPGe detectors with NaI(Tl) scintillation detectors. Particular attention was paid to photopeaks originating from the uranium and thorium decay series. The experiment confirmed that HPGe detectors provide superior resolution, enabling accurate identification and linear energy calibration. The 511 keV annihilation peak was found to lie far from the best-fit calibration line and was excluded from the final analysis to preserve the model's accuracy.