Polarity effect in plane-parallel ionization chambers using air or a dielectric liquid as ionization medium

A plane-parallel ionization chamber having a sensitive volume of 2 mm3 and using the dielectric liquid tetramethylsilane as the sensitive medium instead of air is described. In the design of the chamber special attention was given to the factors that can cause unwanted currents in the cable, stem, or the chamber dielectric material. The chamber has been tested with respect to the polarity effect in regions of radiation fields where ordinary plane-parallel ionization chambers will often fail. These regions are the build-up region in photon fields, and the region close to the practical range for electrons where nonelectronic equilibrium is significant. Experimental results show that, despite the extremely small ionization volume in the liquid ionization chamber, the polarity effect never exceeds a few tenths of a percent in field positions where well-known commercially available chambers with much less spatial resolution designed for measurements in radiation therapy fields can show polarity effects of 5% to 30%. The origin of spurious currents and how they must be minimized in the design of either a liquid- or gas-filled ionization chamber is discussed.