New Neutron-Deficient Isotope of Silver

Silver-103 of 1.1-hour half-life, produced by bombarding silver with high-energy protons, was identified by following the decay with $\beta$-proportional, scintillation, and x-ray proportional counters and by milking the daughter, 17-day ${\mathrm{Pd}}^{103}$, through seven half-lives. Measurements with a $\beta$-ray survey spectrometer showed the presence of conversion electrons of 0.6-Mev energy and positrons of 1.3-Mev maximum energy, both of which decayed with a half-life of 1.1 hours. Aluminum absorption measurements also gave 1.3 Mev as the maximum ${\beta }^{+}$ energy. ${\mathrm{Ag}}^{103}$ decays in part by $K$ capture.