Radioactivity and Radiation by Claus Grupen & Mark Rodgers

Author:Claus Grupen & Mark Rodgers
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Springer International Publishing, Cham

Isotope

Fraction (%)

Half-life

Xenon -133

55.1

5 days

Iodine -131

14.9

8 days

Tellurium -132

9.7

3 days

Iodine -133

7.7

21 hours

Neptunium -239

3.4

2 days

Barium -140

2.0

13 days

Ruthenium -103

1.4

40 days

Strontium -89

0.9

52 days

Caesium -137

0.7

30 years

Zirconium -95

0.7

65 days

Cerium -141

0.7

33 days

Strontium -90

0.07

28 years

Since then, the short-lived fission products have decayed, so that the remaining sources of radiation are the longer-lived isotopes Cs and Sr . These two nuclides will remain in the biosphere for many decades.

Figure 10.1 shows the average Cs content of human bodies in Western Europe over the period from 1960 to 1995. For these people, the (radioactive) caesium exposure due to the reactor accident in Chernobyl was nearly as high as the caesium exposure from all the above-ground nuclear weapons tests in the atmosphere in the 1960s. These surface tests released about 3 tons of plutonium which was distributed worldwide, predominantly in the northern hemisphere. In addition, the neutrons released produced large quantities of and tritium (H) in the atmosphere.

Fig. 10.1Average Cs content of humans in Western Europe from 1960 to 1995. For regions further from Europe, the Chernobyl caesium peak is much less pronounced. The first peak is similar throughout the whole northern hemisphere

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