E-raamat: Analytical Chemistry of Uranium: Environmental, Forensic, Nuclear, and Toxicological Applications

Karpas presents this applied chemistry handbook for detecting and analyzing uranium. The first of five chapters covers the basic properties of uranium and its common compounds, outlines the processes employed to use it for nuclear fuel, and describes the basis of analytical techniques used to characterize it, including atomic absorption and emission spectroscopy, X-ray fluorescence spectrometry, neutron activation analysis, gamma spectroscopy, electron microscopy, mass spectrometry, alpha spectrometry, and miscellaneous spectroscopic and ion counting techniques. The remaining four chapters treat uranium analysis in specific contexts: characterization of uranium ores, fuel, alloys, and waste in industry; detection of uranium in environmental samples; monitoring of exposure and toxicity by analysis of body tissues or fluids, and trace analysis for nuclear forensics. Chapters present the preferred analytical instrumentation and methodology for each application along with rationale and discussion of supporting studies. Annotation ©2015 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)

Accurate uranium analysis, and particularly for isotope measurements, is essential in many fields, including environmental studies, geology, hydrogeology, the nuclear industry, health physics, and homeland security. Nevertheless, only a few scientific books are dedicated to uranium in general and analytical chemistry aspects in particular.Analytical Chemistry of Uranium: Environmental, Forensic, Nuclear, and Toxicological Applicationscovers the fascinating advances in the field of analytical chemistry of uranium.

Exploring a broad range of topics, the book focuses on the analytical aspects of industrial processes that involve uranium, its presence in the environment, health and biological implications of exposure to uranium compounds, and nuclear forensics.

Topics include:

• Examples of procedures used to characterize uranium in environmental samples of soil, sediments, vegetation, water, and air
• Analytical methods used to examine the rigorous specifications of uranium and its compounds deployed in the nuclear fuel cycle
• Health aspects of exposure to uranium and the bioassays used for exposure assessment
• Up-to-date analytical techniques used in nuclear forensics for safeguards in support of non-proliferation, including single particle characterization

Each chapter includes an overview of the topic and several examples to demonstrate the analytical procedures. This is followed by sample preparation, separation and purification techniques where necessary. The book supplies readers with a solid understanding of the analytical chemistry approach used today for characterizing the different facets of uranium, providing a good starting point for further investigation into this important element.