Uptake of 226Ra and 210Pb by food crops cultivated in a region of high natural radioactivity in Brazil

Can barium and strontium be used as tracers for radium in soil–plant transfer studies?

“…Menzel (1954) found that the uptake of strontium and barium was inversely proportional to the exchangeable soil Ca. To the contrary, Vasconcellos et al (1987) argued that the exchangeable Ca in soils did not seem to influence radium uptake by plants in a defined way, as was found in our experiment. The poorer correlation found for barium between the bivalent molar concentrations in soil solutions and the transfer than for radium (Fig.…”

“…Increased exchangeable Ca (Menzel, 1954), increasing pH (Mortvedt, 1994), and high soil sulphate content (Ibrahim and Whicker, 1988) are reported to decrease the radium transfer factor. Vasconcellos et al (1987), however, did not find a relation between soil Caconcentration and Ra-TF.…”

“…In areas of high natural radioactivity, Hewamanna et al (1988) and Vasconcellos et al (1987) could not discern a significant effect of soil Ca on Ra-TF. Menzel (1954) found that the uptake of strontium and barium was inversely proportional to the exchangeable soil Ca.…”

Geoquímica de radionuclídeos naturais em solos de áreas circunvizinhas a uma Unidade de Mineração e Atividade de Urânio

“…Os pequenos percentuais de 210 Pb na F1 (fração biodisponível) têm sido observados em alguns trabalhos e estão relacionados com a baixa mobilidade e biodisponibiliddae desse radionuclídeo (Köhler et al, 2000;Ewers et al, 2003). Os resultados de baixa biodisponibilidade obtidos para 210 Pb em Caetité estão de acordo com os obtidos por Vasconcellos et al (1987) (Langmuir, 1997).…”

Radiometric Evaluation in a Uranium Mine under a Decommisioning Processs

“…These studies were done to characterize the hydrodynamics of the existent aquifer, to evaluate the flow direction, to verify the status of some bio indicators and to assess the natural radionuclides in the environment, among many others (Amaral, 1979;Paschoa et al, 1979;Vasconcellos et al, 1987;Prado, 1994;Campos et al, 2010).…”