Experiments on the seasonality of the cesium translocation in cereals, potatoes and vegetables

Summary

The translocation of cesium from leaves into the edible parts after foliar deposition at different stages of growth has been determined for cereals, potatoes, green beans and carrots in field experiments. For all the plant species investigated a significant seasonality of the cesium translocation was observed. The highest translocation factors were determined after foliar contamination 50 to 60 days before harvest for cereals, and 70 to 90 days and 15 days before harvest for potatoes and green beans, respectively. The variations among the different experiments can be reduced when the translocation is normalized to the yield. This facilitates the application in probabilistic models due to the implicit consideration of the relationship between translocation and yield. The seasonality of the cesium translocation can be described with gaussian functions being consistent with the physiological development of cereals and potatoes. The uncertainty of these approaches is a factor of 3 and 4 for cereals and potatoes, respectively.