Mapping of the contaminants in soil thin sections
EMSL Project ID
1693
Abstract
Dynamic models of the transport and fate of radionuclides in ecosystems include many parameters that can not be easily estimated and often their estimates vary by many orders of magnitude. This project is important in determination how important soil structural features are to the downward migration of strongly bound contaminant. The developed methods may be applied to studies of aerosol particles collected on the filters, contaminant diffusion in concrete, glass-like or other materials. This work has direct relevance to remediation activities at federal sites. The proposed EMSL study consists of the elemental and isotopic mapping of the soil thin sections. The identified by autoradiographic methods hot spots in the soil thin sections could be further investigated for their elemental and isotopic content by using SEM-EDX, SIMS, PIXE, RBS which are not available at the Oregon State University. The results of such elemental mapping of the intact soil depth profile would contribute to better understanding of plutonium and americium chemical bonding and their vertical movement in undisturbed soils over 35 years passed since contamination occured. Size of the soil thin sections is 50cm x 75 cm x 20 microns, they are mounted on the 1 mm thick epoxy resin slides.
Project Details
Project type
Exploratory Research
Start Date
1999-09-29
End Date
2002-03-31
Status
Closed
Released Data Link
Team
Principal Investigator
Related Publications
Crum JV, BJ Riley, and JD Vienna. 2009. "Binary Phase Diagram of the Manganese Oxide-Iron Oxide System." Journal of the American Ceramic Society 92(10):2378-2384. doi:10.1111/j.1551-2916.2009.03230.x