The paper presents unique data of plutonium (241)Pu study in seabirds from northern Eurasia, permanently or temporally living at the southern Baltic Sea coast. Together, ten marine birds species were examined, as follows: three species that permanently reside at the southern Baltic, four species of wintering birds, and three species of migrating birds; 366 samples were analyzed. The obtained re...

Suitable analytical procedures for the bulk analysis of ultra-trace amounts of uranium and plutonium have been developed using multi-collector inductively coupled mass spectrometry (MC–ICP–MS). The quantification and determination of the isotopic ratios of uranium and plutonium in three simulated swipe samples, a swipe blank, and a process blank were performed to validate the analytical perform...

This paper describes rapid methods for the determination of the production date (age dating) of plutonium (Pu) materials by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) for nuclear forensic and safeguards purposes. One of the presented methods is a rapid, direct measurement without chemical separation using 235U/239Pu and 236U/240Pu chronometers. The other method comprises a straightfo...

Almost all major nuclear operations produce residues containing radioactive materials; in reactor operations, for example, the fission products, new elements (such as plutonium) produced by neutron irradiation and the unfissioned nuclear fuel are all radioactive. Some of this material can be put to further use: useful radioisotopes, for instance, can be extracted from the fission products and p...

Plutonium and uranium isotopes decay by alpha particle emission. The alpha particle is absorbed by the nuclei of the low atomic number elements (Li, b, be, O, F, C, Si, etc.) and a neutron is produced. The yield depends upon the chemical composition of the matrix and the alpha production rate for plutonium and uranium. Neutrons from (α,n) reactions are produced randomly (not time-correlated) an...

India has long pursued a fast breeder program, motivated in part by the availability of only poor quality uranium resources within the country. But progress so far has been disappointing, with only one test reactor having been constructed and having a chequered operating history. The larger Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor that is being constructed has a design that compromises safety and will pr...

We present new results on neutron and gamma-ray pulse-height distributions (PHDs) measured with liquid scintillators from five plutonium-oxide samples of varying mass and burnup and a Cf isotopic source. We show that the analysis of the pulse-height distributions can be used to easily distinguish the fissile material (plutonium oxide) from the Cf source. Moreover, the slope of the measured puls...

Many scientists are making the case that humanity is living in a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene, but there is no agreement yet as to when this epoch began. The start might be defined by a historical event, such as the beginning of the fossil-fueled Industrial Revolution or the first nuclear explosion in 1945. Standard stratigraphic practice, however, requires a more significant, globall...

Humus influence on mobility of plutonium and amend urn in soil has been investigated. To do (his the entrance of radionuclides into soil water solutions with different organic matter concentration and the distribution of 2 3 9 , 2 4 0 P u and 2 4 1 Am between humus fractions o f soil has been analyzed.. The mineral and organic sods with distinct quantitative and qualitative composition of humus...