An Improved and Rapid Radiochemical Method for the Determination of Polonium-210 in Urine

Abstract

Measurements of radionuclides in urine are widely used to assess the health impact of intakes of radionuclides. The events that followed the polonium poisoning in London in late 2006 have highlighted the need for rapid and reliable methods that can be applied to emergency situations. Ideally such a method would also be applicable to the routine assessment of radionuclides in urine. This paper discusses the development and validation of such a method for measuring the concentration of 210Po in urine. The method is validated by assessment of the selectivity, accuracy and recovery, and quantification of the uncertainty. The paper describes two variations of the method, based on whether the priority is a rapid turnaround, or higher sensitivity. The detection limit for the excretion rate of 210Po can range from 1.5 to 20 mBq d–1 depending on the dose limit requirements for different categories of exposure (public, occupational, or emergency).

Understanding the Radioactive Ingrowth and Decay of Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials in the Environment: An Analysis of Produced Fluids from the Marcellus Shale

“…TRU resin (Eichrom) was washed three times (5 mL, 4 M HCl) before eluting Po, U, and Th (10 mL, 0.1 M ammonium bioxalate) into 150-mL glass beakers containing approximately 20 mL of 0.1 M HCl. The eluent was then reduced to prevent interferences from iron (0.5 mL, 20% wt/vol hydroxylamine · HCl; 0.1 mL, 1 M ascorbic acid) ( Manickam et al 2010 ). Samples were incubated (90°C) in a double boiler on a stir plate.…”

Collateral contamination concomitant to the polonium-210 poisoning of Mr Alexander Litvinenko

“…It was determined that 819 measurements could be considered to correspond to natural background levels, excluding a large number of values identified by the authors as potentially due to an artificial source or due to recognised enhancement of dietary intake. Almost 550 measurements were extracted from studies reported in the literature (Black 1956, Globel et al 1966, DeBoeck et al 1971, Bale et al 1975, Okabayashi et al 1975, Juan and Balleos 1976, Holtzman et al 1976, Spencer et al 1977, Clemente et al 1979, Helmkamp et al 1979, Okabayashi et al 1982, Irlweck 1983, Mancini et al 1984, Azeredo & Lipsztein 1991, Hunt and Allington 1993, Santos et al 1994, Santos et al 1995, Naumann et al 1998, Santos et al 2000, Thomas et al 2001, Schafer and Seitz 2005, Hunt and Rumney 2007, Manickam et al 2010. The additional measurements were contributions of previously unpublished data, acknowledged by Hodgson (2017).…”

An emergency bioassay method for 210 Po in urine

“…Internal exposure to 210 Po is usually determined by urine bioassay (Bailey et al, 2010); however, few methods are available (Meli et al, 2009;Manickam et al, 2010;Fisenne, 1997;Ham, 2009;Figgins, 1961;Azeredo and Lipsztein, 1991;Guérin and Dai, 2014). These methods can be divided in two categories: spontaneous plating and micro-precipitation procedures.…”

“…In both cases, the 210 Po recovery is corrected using either 208 Po or 209 Po tracer. For the plating methods, the urine sample is often oxidized and heated in a beaker to solubilize 210 Po bound to organic matter (Manickam et al, 2010). Polonium-210 in the sample is usually pre-concentrated by evaporation (Meli et al, 2009;Fisenne, 1997;Ham, 2009;Azeredo and Lipsztein, 1991) or co-precipitation (Manickam et al, 2010) to improve the method sensitivity.…”

“…The residue/precipitate is then dissolved using a small volume of a HCl solution. Finally, 210 Po is spontaneously plated either onto a silver (Meli et al, 2009;Manickam et al, 2010;Ham, 2009) or a nickel (Fisenne, 1997;Figgins, 1961) disc immersed in the HCl solution. The spontaneous plating is usually performed at an elevated temperature (50-95°C) for few hours (1-4 h) to maximize the Po recovery.…”