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Take-down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.Downloaded from the University of Groningen/UMCG research database (Pure): http://www.rug.nl/research/portal. For technical reasons the number of authors shown on this cover page is limited to 10 maximum. AbstractA kinetic model of zircon thermoluminescence (TL) has been constructed to simulate the processes and stages relevant to thermoluminescent dating such as: filling of electron and hole traps during the excitation stage both for natural and laboratory irradiation; the time dependence of fading after laboratory irradiation; TL experiments both after laboratory and natural irradiation. The goal is to inspect qualitative behavior of the system and to unravel the processes and determine the parameters controlling TL phenomena of zircon. The input parameters of the model, such as types and concentrations of the TL centers and energy distributions of the hole and electron traps, were obtained by analyzing the experimental data on fading of the TL-emission spectra of samples from different locations. EPR data were used to establish the nature of the TL centers. Glow curves and 3D TL emission spectra are simulated and compared with the experimental data on time-dependent TL fading. Theoretical dating curves for combined natural plus laboratory irradiation have been calculated for as-irradiated, faded and preheated samples. Ó

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Mineral zircon contains trace amounts (typically 10-1000 ppm) of the a-emitters uranium and thorium, which irradiate this mineral internally. This outstanding feature of zircon turns out to be extremely useful when this mineral is applied as a thermoluminescence (TL) dating medium, because the build-up of the age-dependent luminescence is dominated by the presence of well-defined internal radioactive sources and the contributions to the dose from external radiation sources are two orders of magnitude smaller. The results presented in this paper have led us to the conclusion that for zircon dating it is necessary to carefully select the best and homogeneous zircon grains of the highest optical quality. For successful dating experiments on very young and historically well-defined coastal dune sands, selection of the most stable luminescence component by means of narrow band interference filters is needed. Our results suggest that ultimately optical zircon dating will allow us to determine the age of extremely young samples (e.g. 12 months!).

After exposure to ionizing irradiation, mineral zircon exhibits thermoluminescence (TL), which can be used to calculate the irradiation dose and the age of natural samples. Different aspects of the dating procedure based on zircon TL, including laboratory added irradiation at room and elevated temperatures, fading and preheat processes, have been considered within the framework of the kinetic model developed by our group earlier. It is shown that dose rate effects arising due to the difference between natural and laboratory irradiation can be removed by a suitable preheat treatment of the laboratory irradiated samples prior to the TL measurements. We demonstrate that the TL behaviour of zircon which has been irradiated under natural conditions can be reproduced by means of laboratory irradiation at some elevated temperature. This opens a promising possibility of (i) getting rid of dose rate effects and anomalous fading and (ii) reconstructing the dose dependence of the total TL signal emitted by samples irradiated under natural conditions. The model has been checked by simulating the dating procedures used for our coastal dune sand samples from Ameland (NL), the age of which is known from historical records; the results agree well with the available experimental data. The results of this investigation demonstrate the utility of the kinetic model for planning dating experiments and for development of new and innovative TL dating methods.