Towards low-cost lead screening with transmission XRF

Update, July 30 2026:

A peer-reviewed version of this work has now been published. Please cite this one if you build on our work:

C. Gaßner, J. Reisewitz, J. E. Forsyth, K. Shaker, "Towards low-cost lead screening with transmission XRF" Commun Earth Environ 7, 626 (2026)

This repository contains code to reproduce the results in our Arxiv paper

Figure 1.ipynb

Figure 1c: Typical X-ray fluence from a smoke detector 241Am sample	Figure 1d: Comparing backscatter and transmission geometries for lead detection in soil with 241Am

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Figure 2d: Optimal soil thickness for 100 ppm Pb in soil	Figure S1: Optimal soil thickness for 10 and 1000 ppm Pb in soil

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Figure 3c and e: Signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and Limit of detection (LOD) as a function of measurement time (10-1000 ppm Pb in soil)	Figure 3b: Simulated detector spectra at example timepoints and Pb concentrations

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Figure 4b: Required measurement time as a function of detector specifications

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