Effects of digestion, chemical separation, and deposition on Po-210 quantitative analysis

The purpose of this work was to determine polonium losses from a variety of sample types (soil, cotton fiber, and air filter) due to digestion technique, chemical separation, and deposition method for alpha energy analysis. Results demonstrated that yields from a perchloric acid wet-ash (87 ± 5 %) were similar to that from a microwave digestion (100 ± 7 %), but both were greater than the dry-ash procedure (38 ± 5 %). The polonium was separated from an SRM soil using an AG1X8 ion exchange column and deposited on a Ag disk with a recovery of 83 ± 7 % of polonium-209 (Po-209). Deposition yields without chemical separation averaged 90 ± 5 % of Po-209. The polonium-210 content was successfully measured in the three matrix types and quantitated using alpha spectroscopy.