Traces of particulate radioactive iodine (I) were detected in the European atmosphere in January/February 2017. Concentrations of this nuclear fission product were very low, ranging 0.1 to 10 μBq m except at one location in western Russia where they reached up to several mBq m. Detections have been reported continuously over an 8-week period by about 30 monitoring stations. We examine possible emission source apportionments and rank them considering their expected contribution in terms of orders of magnitude from typical routine releases: radiopharmaceutical production units > sewage sludge incinerators > nuclear power plants > spontaneous fission of uranium in soil. Inverse modeling simulations indicate that the widespread detections of I resulted from the combination of multiple source releases. Among them, those from radiopharmaceutical production units remain the most likely. One of them is located in Western Russia and its estimated source term complies with authorized limits. Other existing sources related toI use (medical purposes or sewage sludge incineration) can explain detections on a rather local scale. As an enhancing factor, the prevailing wintertime meteorological situations marked by strong temperature inversions led to poor dispersion conditions that resulted in higher concentrations exceeding usual detection limits in use within the informal Ring of Five (Ro5) monitoring network.

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and En vi ron men tal Pro tec tion, Uni ver sity Un ion-Nikola Tesla, Bel grade, Ser bia 2 In no va tion Cen tre, Fac ulty of Me chan i cal En gi neer ing, Uni ver sity of Bel grade, Bel grade, Ser bia 3 De part ment of Ra di a tion and En vi ron men tal Pro tec tion, Vin~a In sti tute of Nu clear Sci ences, Uni ver sity of Bel grade, Bel grade, Ser bia 4 Min ing In sti tute, L.t.d., Bel grade, Ser bia Sci en tific pa per

Ceramic tiles are one of the commonly used decorative building materials. Body of ceramic tiles is a mixture of different raw materials including clays, quartz materials and feldspat, and may be glazed or left unglazed. Due to the presence of zircon in the glaze, ceramic tiles can show natural radioactivity concentration significantly higher than the average values for building materials. This study presents a summary of results obtained by a survey which was consisted of measurements of activity concentrations of natural radionuclides in imported ceramic tile samples used in Serbia using a gamma spectrometer with HPGe detector. Based on the obtained concentrations, gamma index, radium equivalent activity, the indoor absorbed dose rate and the corresponding annual effective dose were evaluated to assess the potential radiological hazard associated with these building materials.

Forests, with a large coverage of lands area, represent important ecosystem. They have greater ability to absorb atmospheric pollutant, including radionuclides compared to other vegetation types. Thus it is important to monitor radionuclides concentration in forest ecosystems. The results of the first gamma-spectrometric measurements in 16500 ha large region of South-western Serbia are presented. It is investigated activity concentrations of 40K, 137Cs and 210Pb in different deciduous and evergreen trees in the region. For all investigated isotopes, it was observed tendency that the smallest activity concentrations in average were found in tree stem, than in leaves, while the highest ones were in soil. Statistical analysis did not show any differences between activity concentrations of leaves and needles, showing that both leaves and needles could be equally well used as a biomonitors.

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