IN MANY CASES, MASS SPECTROSCOPY, ALPHA, BETA SPECTROSCOPY MAY BE USEFUL

Thanks

Please specify a bit better which type of RadioActivity measurements you are performing.... (you refer to Activity concentration , are you measuring soil or environmental radioactivity?)... Specify as well what radioisotopes are you expecting to find because not all radio-isotopes are alpha or beta emitters hence alpha beta spectroscopy might not be applicable...

The most common Techniques to measure radioactivity in the samples are:

Gamma Spectrometry

Alpha Spectrometry

LSC - Liquid Scintillation Spdctrometry

If about Gamma Spectrometry the sample preparation is normally very easy, for Alpha and LSC the samples need to be treated by radiochemical tecnhiques, i.e. dissolution of sample, sequential extraxtion by resin or separation by resin or precipitation fo elements, befor the mesurements...

In my opinion before select the measurements technique, you may know what is your goal. I think you could ask:1) What radionuclide or radionuclides i want search and measure? 2) How many grams of sample i have? 3) Whta is the MDA, Minimum Detectable Activity, i need? 4) I know the sample story/life? Is important if you measure NORM materials, because you could know if there is the secular equilibrium in all the chain or only in a part of it.

Remember if you use the radiochemical tecnhiques associated with Alpha and LSC spectromery you can obtain very low MDA with few grams of smaples...but is very complicated for some radionculides, and you need of resin, chemical ragents, knowledge ecc...

With gamma spectrometry you can measure a lot of radionuclides in the same time, easy sample preparation, but sometimes you have very high MDA...or is not possible determine the secular equilibrium (Uranium 238 and 234 for example…)

Depending on your goal...

Some example in my opinion:

Elements of Uranium and Thorium Chain: Alpha and LSC spectrometry after radiochemical treatment sample. You could read the AQ34 IAEA to understand the details.

Alpha: Uranium-238,235 and 234, Radium-226, Polonium-210, Thorium, Am-241, Pu-239+240 and 238;

LSC: Lead-210, Radium-228, Sr-90, H-3 and C-14

Best Regards

Mattia

Beta spectroscopy? Alphas and gammas are mono-energetic, but betas will always give you a spectrum of energies. You can still quantitate beta emitters various detection methods, but you won't get a nice, sharp lines of energies. If your unknown has a long enough half-life, it might be easier to quantitate it using non-radioactive methods, e.g., ICP-MS.

Enrico Corniani Mushtaq Ahmad William Uhland Mattia Taroni

Thank you for your responses. Your responses are valuable and have great information.

I am trying to measure gamma radiation in foodstuffs. I am focusing on U-238, Th-232, K-40 and Cs-137.

Thanks

Dear Alsalihi,

i don't know what do you want search in foodstuff,

but if you want you could start by these documents:

https://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/trs295_web.pdf

http://www.unscear.org/docs/publications/2016/UNSCEAR_2016_GA-Report.pdf

But when you want measure the radioactivity in fooodstuff you must know, if is not a radiological emergency, thath the value are very low...and is correct selectd the correct procedure and technique use.

Best Regards

Mattia