Evaluation of the mean energy deposit during the impact of charged particles on liquid water

The DNA strand break yield due to the impact of ionizing particles on living beings is closely related to the number of inelastic events per unit absorbed dose produced by these particles. The higher this number, the higher the probability of causing DNA strand breaks per unit absorbed dose. In a previous work, it was found that the total number of events produced by primary particles and the secondary electrons is almost independent of the type and energy of the incident particle (or LET). This finding could be supported by a quasi-constant mean energy deposit by inelastic event (ε). In this work, ε was defined and determined for electrons and the non-negative charge states of hydrogen (H?,?) and helium (He?,?,2?) species impacting on liquid water. Ionization, excitation and charge transfer (up to two-electron transfers) processes have been included in present calculations. We found that, for liquid water, ε is within 13.7 ±?4.1 eV, 14.2 ± 1.7 eV and 13.8 ± 1.4 eV for electrons, hydrogen and helium species, respectively, with impact energies changing over three orders of magnitude. Unlike the mean excitation energy, the mean energy deposit per inelastic event depends not only on the target molecule but also on the projectile features. However, this dependence is relatively weak. This fact supports the quasi-independent number of inelastic events per unit absorbed dose found previously when charged particles impact on matter.