Plutonium decay products

In the above analysis we have neglected the plutonium decay products and their associated hazards. All of Pu, Pu and Pu decay to much longer lived and less hazardous uranium isotopes. However, Pu (originally present to 1% in reactor plutonium) decays through Ra, and Pu (originally present to 12%) decays through Both radium and neptunium are of high radio-... 

A general conclusion from the review of the distribution of plutonium between different compartments of the ecosystem was that the enrichment of plutonium from water to food was fairly well compensated for by man s metabolic discrimination against plutonium. Therefore, under the conditions described above, it may be concluded that plutonium from a nuclear waste repository in deep granite bedrock is not likely to reach man in concentrations exceeding permissible levels. However, considering the uncertainties in the input equilibrium constants, the site-specific Kd-values and the very approximate transport equation, the effects of the decay products, etc. — as well as the crude assumptions in the above example — extensive research efforts are needed before the safety of a nuclear waste repository can be scientifically proven. 

UIC. 1997. Most smoke detectors contain an artificially produced radioisotope americium-241. Americium-241 is made in nuclear reactors, and is a decay product of plutonium-241. Uranium Information Center. Nuclear Issues Briefing Paper 35. http //www.uic.com.au/nip35.htm. January 27, 2000. 

The plutonium concentration in marine samples is principally due to environmental pollution caused by fallout from nuclear explosions and is generally at very low levels [75]. Environmental samples also contain microtraces of natural a emitters (uranium, thorium, and their decay products) which complicate the plutonium determinations [76]. Methods for the determination of plutonium in marine samples must therefore be very sensitive and selective. The methods reported for the chemical separation of plutonium are based on ion exchange resins [76-80] or liquid-liquid extraction with tertiary amines [81], organophosphorus compounds [82,83], and ketones [84,85]. 

The chemistry of neptunium (jjNp) is somewhat similar to that of uranium (gjU) and plutonium (g4Pu), which immediately precede and follow it in the actinide series on the periodic table. The discovery of neptunium provided a solution to a puzzle as to the missing decay products of the thorium decay series, in which all the elements have mass numbers evenly divisible by four the elements in the uranium series have mass numbers divisible by four with a remainder of two. The actinium series elements have mass numbers divisible by four with a remainder of three. It was not until the neptunium series was discovered that a decay series with a mass number divisible by four and a remainder of one was found. The neptunium decay series proceeds as follows, starting with the isotope plutonium-241 Pu-24l—> Am-24l Np-237 Pa-233 U-233 Th-229 Ra-225 Ac-225 Fr-221 At-217 Bi-213 Ti-209 Pb-209 Bi-209. 

Plutonium-239 and its decay products (may contain plutonium-240 and other isotopes), as... 

The scraps which arise during the fabrication of plutonium-containing nuclear fuels are collected and stored for some time before they are processed to recover the plutonium. Due to the decay of Pu-241, considerable amounts of Am-241 may build up in the stored material. At the Alkem company, plutonium is recovered from the scrap by anion exchange the americium which is not sorbed on the resin is collected in the combined effluents from the loading and wash steps. The effluents are concentrated by evaporation besides americium, the concentrated effluents contain major amounts of uranium, plutonium, corrosion products, and residues from chemical reagents. A typical composition is given below ... 

All actinide elements of the 5/series are radioactive. Th and U are long lived and occur in minerals that also contain their radioactive decay products. Elements beyond uranium are made artificially, by bombardment with neutrons or with nuclei. Uranium and plutonium are used as nuclear fuels. 

After the discovery of uranium radioactivity by Henri Becquerel in 1896, uranium ores were used primarily as a source of radioactive decay products such as Ra. With the discovery of nuclear fission by Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassman in 1938, uranium became extremely important as a source of nuclear energy. Hahn and Strassman made the experimental discovery Lise Meitner and Otto Frisch provided the theoretical explanation. Enrichment of the spontaneous fissioning isotope U in uranium targets led to the development of the atomic bomb, and subsequently to the production of nuclear-generated electrical power. There are considerable amounts of uranium in nuclear waste throughout the world, see also Actinium Berkelium Einsteinium Fermium Lawrencium Mendelevium Neptunium Nobelium Plutonium Protactinium Rutherfordium Thorium. 

Since the isotope Am can be prepared in relatively pure form by extraction as a decay product over a pmod of years from strongly neutron-bombarded plutonium, Pu, this isotope is used for much of the chemical investigation of this element. Better suited is the isotope Am due to its longer half-life (7.37 x 10 years as compared to 432.2 years for Am). A mixture of the isotopes Am, Am, and Am can be prepared by intense neutron irradiation of Am according to the reactions Am (n, y) —> Am (n, y) —> Am. Nearly isotr ically pure Am can be prepared by a sequence of neutron bombardments and chemical separations as follows neutron bombardment of Am yields Pu by the reactions Am (n, y) Am after chemical separation the Pu can be transformed to Am via the reactions Pu (n, y) Pu Am, and the Am can... 

Sources of radiation in fresh fuel are plutonium isotopes, products of decay of the plutonium isotopes, and impurities of products of fission in the regenerated plutonium. As a result, the gamma and neutron radiation dose on a surface of fresh fuel bundles generated by fuel from weapon plutonium exceeds by more than an order of magnitude the appropriate dose capacity for FB from uranium fuel. Moreover, capacity of dose on a surface of FB with regenerated plutonium exceeds on an order of magnitude the dose capacity for FB with weapons plutonium. 

The first transuranium element, number 93, was discovered in 1939 by Edwin M. McMillan (1907-1991) at the University of California while he was investigating the fission of uranium. He named it neptunium for the planet Neptune. In 1941, element 94, plutonium, was identified as a beta-decay product of neptunium ... 

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