Determination of americium-241 in sediments by gamma spectroscopy

A radiochemical method is given for the determination of Am-241 from the global fallout in sediments. The concept of a concentration step to separate Am-241 from the bulk of the sample (1-2 kg wet) by coprecipitation followed by low energy gamma spectroscopy was investigated. A series of experiments with tracer added was performed to measure the recovery of americium by coprecipitation. Also, a number of real samples without tracer were examined and the conditions for the optimum separation are given. The applied gamma method and the conventional, accurate, but tedious, aplha technique via 243Am, which is usually applied for the determination of Am-241, agreed mostly within 10 %.