Trace radioactive pollutant; Cs in water; Cs in soil; Low pressure plasma; ITO film;SHOCK-WAVE PLASMA; SAMPLES; LIBS

An experimental study has been conducted for the practical and in situ application of laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) for the detection of Cs pollutant in water and soil in the nearby area of Fukushima Nuclear Power Station. The spectrochemical measurements were carried out by means of 355 nm Nd-YAG laser with N-2 and He ambient gases at atmospheric and low pressures. The soil samples were prepared by pelletizing the mixtures of 80% soil and 20% KBr while the aqueous samples were prepared as thin films electro deposited on indium tin oxide (ITO) glass. The resulted emission spectra using 0.5 kPa N-2 ambient gas shows the minimum detectable Cs concentration of 0.2 ppm and 0.3 ppm in the water and soil samples, respectively. The result of this experiment has thus demonstrated the viability of the LIBS equipment employed here as a more practical, in-situ and even mobile alternative to the standard use of gamma-ray spectroscopy using germanium detector. (C) 2017 Published by Elsevier B.V.

DOUBLE-PULSE; QUANTITATIVE-ANALYSIS; INDUCED PLASMA; DEUTERIUM; ABLATION; CHAMBER; GAS

An experimental study is conducted in search of the much needed experimental method for practical and minimally destructive analysis of hydrogen (H) and deuterium (D) in a nuclear power plant. For this purpose, a picosecond (ps) Nd:YAG laser is employed and operated with 300-500 mu J output energies in a variety of ambient gases at various gas pressures. The sample chamber used is specially designed small quartz tube with an open end that can be tightly fitted to the sample surface. It is found that ambient Ar gas at reduced pressure of around 0.13 kPa gives the best spectral quality featuring fully resolved H and D emission lines with clearly detectable intensities and practically free from surface water interference. The D emission intensities measured from zircaloy plates containing various concentrations of D impurity are shown to yield a linear calibration line with extrapolated zero intercept, offering its potential application to quantitative analysis. The estimated detection limit of less than 10 ppm is well below the sensitivity limit of around 600 ppm required for the regular inspection of zircaloy tubes in a heavy water nuclear power plant. The use of the exceedingly low laser energy is shown to offer an additional advantage of minimum destructive effect marked by the resulted tiny craters of about 5 mu m diameter with 25 mu m depth. These results promise the potential development of the desired alternative analytical tool for regular in situ and real time inspection of the zircaloy tubes in a heavy water power plant.

COASTAL ZONE; TSUNAMI; CONTAMINATION; THAILAND

In this work, LIBS technique has been used for detection of heavy metal especially iron, Fe in soil sample. As there are a large number of emission spectral lines due to Fe and other constituents in soil, this study is intended to identify emission spectral lines of Fe and finally to find best fit emission spectral lines for carrying out a qualitative and quantitative analysis. LIBS apparatus used in this work consists of a laser system (Neodymium Yttrium Aluminum Garnet, Nd-YAG: Quanta Ray; LAB SERIES; 1,064 nm; 500 mJ; 8 ns) and an optical multichannel analyzer (OMA) system consisting of a spectrograph (McPherson model 2061; 1,000 mm focal length; f/8.6 Czerny-Turner) and an intensified charge coupled device (ICCD) 1024x256 pixels (Andor I*Star). The soil sample was collected from Banda Aceh city, Aceh, Indonesia. For spectral data acquisition, the soil sample has been prepared by a pressing machine in the form of pellet. The laser beam was focused using a high density lens (f=+150 mm) and irradiated on the surface of the pellet for generating luminous plasma under 1 atmosphere of air surrounding. The plasma emission was collected by an optical fiber and then sent to the optical multichannel analyzer (OMA) system for acquisition of the emission spectra. It was found that there are many Fe emission lines both atomic lines (Fe I) and ionic lines (Fe II) appeared in all detection windows in the wavelength regions, ranging from 200 nm to 1000 nm. The emission lines of Fe with strong intensities occurs together with emission lines due to other atoms such as Mg, Ca, and Si. Thus, the identification of emission lines from Fe is complicated by presence of many other lines due to other major and minor elements in soil. Considering the features of the detected emission lines, several emission spectral lines of Fe I (atomic emission line), especially Fe I 404.58 nm occurring at visible range are potential to be good candidate of analytical lines in relation to detection heavy metal pollution, Fe, in soil sample.