TAU-4 installation intended for long-term monitoring of a half-life value of the $^{212}$Po

Abstract

Description of the TAU-4 installation intended for long-term monitoring of the half-life value $T_{1/2}$ of the $^{212}$Po is presented. Natural thorium used as a source of the mother's chain. The methods of measurement and data processing are described. The comparative results of short test measurements carried out in the ground (680 h) and underground (564 h) laboratories are given. Averaged value $T_{1/2}$ =$294.09\pm 0.07$ ns of the $^{212}$Po half-life has been found for the ground level data set similar one for the underground data set. The solar-daily variations with amplitudes $A_{So}=(11.7\pm 5.2)\times10^{-4}$ for the ground data and $A_{So}=(7.5\pm 4.1)\times10^{-4}$ for the underground one were found in a series of $\tau$ values.