Nuclear Chemistry

Biography

Biography: Anfal Ismaeel

Abstract

Nine stations of the dust collector (PVC bucket of 0.2 m diameter and 0.4 m depth) were deployed to collect dust fallout for the period of 23 mo (Oct 2009 to Aug 2011) on monthly bases. Adequate dust samples were collected using four collectors in each station. The weight of the collected dust were varied from 0.5 g to about 3 g. Ultra Low Background gamma spectrometry equipped with a Broad Energy Germanium detector was used to determine the concentration of (⁷Be, ²¹⁰Pb, ⁴⁰K and ¹³⁷Cs). However, the corrected factor for the sampling time was applied for the short-lived isotope (⁷Be). The radionuclide deposition rates were calculated using the massic activities (Bq.g^-1) and the deposition fluxes (g m^-2 mo^-1). The average monthly deposition rates were 35.4, 11.2, 13.2, and 0.3 (Bq m^-2 mo^-1) for ⁷Be, ²¹⁰Pb, ⁴⁰K and ¹³⁷Cs, respectively. The temporal variation of the radionuclides depositions rates showed maxima during spring months (February, March, and April) and lowest in October and November. Similar trend was found for the dust deposition rates where the average was 50 mg m^-2 h^-1 with an extreme value of 664 mg m^-2 h^-1 was reported during March 2011 when an exotic dust storm hit Kuwait. The correlation between the radionuclide depositional fluxes and the dust deposition rates showed that ⁴⁰K has the strongest correlation (0.92) while the ⁷Be was the weakest (0.67). The maximum of the annual effective dose of ¹³⁷Cs inhalation was found negligible (2.43 10-3 mSv).