TY  - JOUR
A1  - Maier, Andreas
A1  - Jones, Jesse
A1  - Sternkopf, Sonja
A1  - Friedrich, Erik
A1  - Fournier, Claudia
A1  - Kraft, Gerhard
T1  - Radon adsorption in charcoal
T2  - International journal of environmental research and public health
N2  - Radon is pervasive in our environment and the second leading cause of lung cancer induction after smoking. Therefore, the measurement of radon activity concentrations in homes is important. The use of charcoal is an easy and cost-efficient method for this purpose, as radon can bind to charcoal via Van der Waals interaction. Admittedly, there are potential influencing factors during exposure that can distort the results and need to be investigated. Consequently, charcoal was exposed in a radon chamber at different parameters. Afterward, the activity of the radon decay products 214Pb and 214Bi was measured and extrapolated to the initial radon activity in the sample. After an exposure of 1 h, around 94% of the maximum value was attained and used as a limit for the subsequent exposure time. Charcoal was exposed at differing humidity ranging from 5 to 94%, but no influence on radon adsorption could be detected. If the samples were not sealed after exposure, radon desorbed with an effective half-life of around 31 h. There is also a strong dependence of radon uptake on the chemical structure of the recipient material, which is interesting for biological materials or diffusion barriers as this determines accumulation and transport.
KW  - radon
KW  - charcoal
KW  - adsorption
KW  - desorption
Y1  - 2021
UR  - http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/62126
UR  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-621262
SN  - 1660-4601
N1  - This research was funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, Germany, grant numbers 02NUK017A and 02NUK050A.
VL  - 18
IS  - 9, art. 4454
SP  - 1
EP  - 7
PB  - MDPI AG
CY  - Basel
ER  -