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Rapid determination of actinides in asphalt samples

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Abstract

A new rapid method for the determination of actinides in asphalt samples has been developed that can be used in emergency response situations or for routine analysis. If a radiological dispersive device, improvised nuclear device or a nuclear accident such as the accident at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant in March, 2011 occurs, there will be an urgent need for rapid analyses of many different environmental matrices, including asphalt materials, to support dose mitigation and environmental clean-up. The new method for the determination of actinides in asphalt utilizes a rapid furnace step to destroy bitumen and organics present in the asphalt and sodium hydroxide fusion to digest the remaining sample. Sample preconcentration steps are used to collect the actinides and a new stacked TRU Resin + DGA Resin column method is employed to separate the actinide isotopes in the asphalt samples. The TRU Resin plus DGA Resin separation approach, which allows sequential separation of plutonium, uranium, americium and curium isotopes in asphalt samples, can be applied to soil samples as well.

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Acknowledgments

This work was performed under the auspices of the Department of Energy, DOE Contract No. DE-AC09-96SR18500. The authors wish to acknowledge Staci Britt, Jack Herrington and Becky Chavous for their assistance with this work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Savannah River National Laboratory, Building 735-B, Aiken, SC, 29808, USA

    Sherrod L. Maxwell, Brian K. Culligan & Jay B. Hutchison

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  1. Sherrod L. Maxwell
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  2. Brian K. Culligan
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  3. Jay B. Hutchison
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Correspondence to Sherrod L. Maxwell.

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Maxwell, S.L., Culligan, B.K. & Hutchison, J.B. Rapid determination of actinides in asphalt samples. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 299, 1891–1901 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-013-2885-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-013-2885-0

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