1. Scope
This practice covers the determination of alpha emitting isotopes of uranium, plutonium, americium and curium in vegetation samples in the range of 0.002 Bq/gram (0.054 pCi/gram) or greater.
There is a need for rapid radioanalytical methods both for routine surveillance testing and for emergency response. Traditional methods for the analysis of alpha emitting isotopes of americium, curium, plutonium and uranium are time consuming, labor-intensive, and generally require several days of sample preparation and separation chemistry prior to counting the sample test source for each target isotope. Traditional wet-oxidation sample ashing requires large volumes of concentrated nitric acid, hydrogen peroxide, and/or perchloric acid and several hours of labor-intensive work. Charring and ashing, dry-oxidation, in a muffle furnace requires a slow ramp up to temperature, relatively long holding time, and slow ramp down. Microwave digestion wet-oxidation is limited to small sample sizes, approximately 1 g, which significantly increases the limit of quantitation. It is anticipated that this standard will be adopted by the FDA/USDA and by other laboratories performing actinide radiochemical analyses.
Keywords
Americium; Curium; Plutonium; Uranium; alpha spectrometry; vegetation; Am-241; Cm-243; Cm-244; Pu-238; Pu-239; Pu-239/240; U-234; U-235; U-236; U-238
The title and scope are in draft form and are under development within this ASTM Committee.
Citing ASTM Standards
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