Reply to the:Comment concerning the publication of M. R. Zaman “Charge plate technique in recoil study. Part IV. Effect of pyridine on the electrodeposition of 128 I species from (n, γ) activated iodoform-pyridine mixtures” by H. Müller

Abstract

Professor MOLLER finds my experimental equipment (Fig. l In the present set of experiments, Ag/AgI, electrodes were used. What actually Fig. 1 shows how Ag/AgI electrodes were prepared. The electrolytic deposition of iodide ions over two silver electrodes was accomplished separately and successively by the electrolysis of two freshly prepared 3% aqueous KI solution using a copper electrode as dummy. The set-up for neutron irradiation and collection of radioiodine species are not depicted in the present paper and outlined elsewhere (cf. Ref. 13 and 14 of the article). The charged species thus collected gave a high specific activity that was measured with the help of a thin end window 13-T GM counter coupled with necessary electronic accessories. So our experimental equipments and set-up were quite satisfactory and adequate in studying the reactions of recoil iodine species produced by neutron capture in the present system.The 'Comment' has several portions that require response and I intend to discuss those in order to clarify the queries made by Professor MOLLER.(1) I do not think that our experimental set up introduced any procedural error for our purpose because 100% deposition of charged species is not that practicable primarily due to solution and wire resistances. Moreover, some mass transfer processes between electrode surfaces and solution may be operative. The activities (counts per minute) recorded in Table 1 (cf. The article) are the fraction of the total anionic 1281 activities produced in the dense molecular mixtures of iodoform and pyridine. Our blank experiments without an electric field show that radioactivities collected on the electrodes are negligible and decay within the time much shorter than the half life period of 128I. From this observation one can deduce that adsorption effects would be small. Further, this indicates that the activities collected on the electrodes under a high potential gradient are the charged recoil 128I species produced during the neutron irradiation of the target solutions.