Cosmic ray studies on the ISS using SSNTD, BRADOS projects, 2001–2003

The BRADOS 1–3 projects were organised by the Russian Space Agency (RZA) between 2001 and 2003. The aim was to study the contribution of the primary galactic cosmic rays and of the secondary particles to the dose received by the crew of the International Space Station (ISS). Several laboratories participated in these experiments. Two different stacks (constructed by the team of the Atomic Energy Research Institute, AERI, Budapest, Hungary) composed of solid-state nuclear track detectors (SSNTD) were exposed inside the Service Module at different locations. The calibrations were made at the CERN high-energy neutron reference field named CERF (Geneva, Swiss). Applying a multiple track etching technique (2–20 h etching time) and a sophisticated image analyser, the secondary neutron dose was deduced. The composition of stacks, the evaluation methods and the results will be presented here or referenced to previous papers.