Distribution and source identification of Pu in the tidal flat wetlands of northern Jiangsu Province and radial sand ridge of southern Yellow Sea-An explanation of “land-sea interaction”

Wang, Ruirui; Zhu, Yawei; Hu, Feifei; Xu, Xinyue; Sun, Zhuyou; Li, Yong

doi:10.1016/j.catena.2021.105506

Cited by 7 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Establishing a background database of plutonium activity and ratio in China's surrounding marine environment is particularly important. In recent years, a large number of literature reports have documented the activity and 240 Pu/ 239 Pu atom ratio in surface and core sediments in the China Sea, as shown in Figure 1 [127][128][129][130][131][132][133][134]. Huang et al [135] studied the spatial distribution and sources of 239 Pu and 240 Pu in surface sediments from 516 locations in the China Sea and adjacent seas.…”

Section: Global Fallout Plutonium For Environmental Applicationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Progress of the Analytical Methods and Application of Plutonium Isotopes in the Environment

et al. 2023

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Since the beginning of the use of nuclear energy in the twentieth century, atmospheric nuclear weapons testing, nuclear accidents, and spent fuel reprocessing have released large amounts of radioisotopes into the environment, especially plutonium isotopes. As an important anthropogenic radionuclide, plutonium is mainly produced by neutron irradiation of uranium. Plutonium isotopes and their ratios from different sources have a specific ‘fingerprint’, which is determined by irradiation time and intensity. Accordingly, several methods have been developed for the analysis of plutonium isotopes. As a popular new tracer in recent years, plutonium isotopes could be used for environmental tracer applications and source identification of regional environmental contamination sources. This paper summarizes and compares the pretreatment of plutonium isotopes in various samples and the detection and analysis methods in recent years. Plutonium isotopes in various environmental samples were enriched by chemical treatments, such as ashing, acid digestion, and alkali fusion. Then it was purified and separated by extraction resins to remove interfering nuclides for the subsequent mass spectrometry. The practical applications of plutonium isotopes and their related ratios in the environment are summarized, such as the determination of plutonium isotopes and their related ratios in the environment near two representative nuclear power plant accidents and the monitoring of the safe operation of nuclear power plants; the establishment of a plutonium isotope database in the vicinity of Chinese waters; and the traceability of plutonium isotopes in environmental regions through the global atmosphere and sand and dust. Finally, the outlook for subsequent research in plutonium isotope detection and applications is presented.

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