Nuclear measurements, mineral analysis

The concentrations of various substances in water in dissolved, colloidal, or suspended form are typically low but vary considerably. A hardness value of up to 400 ppm of calcium carbonate, for example, is sometimes tolerated in public supplies, whereas 1 ppm of dissolved iron would be imacceptable. In treated water for high-pressure boilers or where radiation effects are important, as in nuclear reactors, impurities are measured in very small units such as parts per billion (ppb) or 1 /ig of contaminant per hter of water. Water analysis for drinldng water supplies is concerned mainly with pollution and bacteriological tests. For industrial supphes a mineral analysis is of more interest The important constituents can be classified as follows [9] ... 

Nuclear radiation has been used for borehole and well analysis, generally referred to as logging. Detecting and measuring the radiation permits an evaluation of the properties of a formation surrounding the borehole and therefore, is used for locating and extracting, for example, radioactive mineral deposits and petroleum. 

In many laboratories that have access to a nuclear reactor, neutron activation is used for the chemical analysis of rocks, minerals, petroleum, biological tissues, alloys, etc., and the technique is well suited for the determination of the concentrations of trace elements in polymers. Neutron activation analysis was used by Given et al. (1) in their studies of water tree growth in polymeric insulation and by Wu and Chen (2) in their studies of dopant-polymer interactions in MoCl5-dcped polyacetylene films. In this work the principles of the method are described and the possibilities are illustrated by means of measurements carried out on polyethylene. 

Ozawa K, Nagasawa H (2001) Chemical and isotopic fractionations by evaporation and their cosmochemical applications. Geochim Cosmochim Acta 65 2171-2199 Pacaud L, Ingrin J, Jaoul O (1999) High-temperature diffusion of oxygen in synthetic diopside measured by nuclear reaction analysis. Mineral Mag 53 673-686... 

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