Assigning
indoor radon doses to populations based on the widely used, cumulative
radon concentration monitoring techniques is beset with errors arising
due to uncertain equilibrium factors and unattached fractions. Moreover,
the dose conversion factor (DCF) of radon decay products may vary by a
factor of ~40 within the particle size range from ~0.5 nm to tens of
micrometers. An ideal detector should have a response, which closely
mimics the strong dependence of the DCF on the particle size. In this
context, we propose a new approach in which the doses are computed
directly from the time integrated progeny deposition fluxes on a
suitably tailored surrogate surface. The deposition on this wire-mesh
capped detector system closely mimics the deposition rate in human
respiratory tract. The detection unit consists of an optimally designed
wire-mesh capped Direct Radon Progeny Sensor (DRPS) system. Of the
different wire-mesh types, 100 mesh types were found to be suitable
considering the fine and coarse fraction penetration efficiencies. The
calibration factor was theoretically derived as 0.0077 {mSv (Tracks cm-2)-1}, for converting the measured atom flux in the 100-mesh capped DRPS system to inhalation dose attributed to radon progeny.