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Analysis of radioactivity of negative-ion powder and determination of 232Th

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Abstract

Negative-ion powders containing naturally occurring radioactive materials (NORM) can be traded freely in several countries. To assess the radiological risk of negative-ion powders in China, we used gamma spectrometry, EDS spectrometry, and alpha spectrometry to analyze twelve negative-ion powders purchased online. The results have shown that this batch of samples containing NORM originated from the mining tailings. The activity concentrations for 232Th, 238U, and 226Ra in samples were in the range of 17–339 Bq·g−1, 2.8–36 Bq·g−1, and < 63 Bq·g−1, respectively, which far exceeded the exemption limit, 1 Bq·g−1 for each radionuclide in the 238U and 232Th decay chains.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the anonymous reviewers whose suggestions helped to improve and clarify this paper.

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Correspondence to Zhi Chen.

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Xu, P., Yu, G., Xu, F. et al. Analysis of radioactivity of negative-ion powder and determination of 232Th. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 332, 1453–1457 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-022-08704-4

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