Automatic analysis of continuum phenomena in gamma spectra

A method to fit the continuum of gamma spectra, developed to determine the baseline below full-energy peaks, is applied to the study of structures contained within the continuum. Specifically, we analyze the two spectral lines which appear in the background spectra of a low-level germanium gamma-ray spectrometer due to the inelastic scattering of cosmic-ray, tertiary fast-neutrons on 72Ge and 74Ge. The automatic analysis of the continuum it makes possible to characterize completely the cosmic-ray induced background and to study the environmental fast-neutron flux.