FISSION-TRACK RETENTION IN MINERALS AS A FUNCTION OF HEATING TIME DURING ISOTHERMAL EXPERIMENTS - DISCUSSION

The linear dependence of track retention on logarithm of heating time (at constant temperature) has been verified by statistical analysis of data on isothermal annealing of apatite. The other functions proposed (ρ{variant}/ρ{variant}0 as a linearly decreasing function of exp t or t) fit the experimental data only within a limited range of heating times, where the shapes of all three are experimentally hard to resolve. The logarithmic relationship implies a memory of tracks for thermal events and creates a basis for methods of age corrections. © 1979.