Validation of Electrochemically Modulated Separations Performed On-Line with MC-ICP-MS for Uranium and Plutonium Isotopic Analyses

Conference · Wed Aug 11 04:00:00 EDT 2010

OSTI ID:1004522

Liezers, Martin; Olsen, Khris B; Mitroshkov, Alexandre V; Duckworth, Douglas C

The most time consuming process in uranium or plutonium isotopic analyses is performing the requisite chromatographic separation of the actinides. Filament preparation for thermal ionization (TIMS) adds further delays, but is generally accepted due to the unmatched performance in trace isotopic analyses. Advances in Multi-Collector Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (MC-ICP-MS) are beginning to rival the performance of TIMS. Methods, such as Electrochemically Modulated Separations (EMS) can efficiently pre-concentrate U or Pu quite selectively from small solution volumes in a matrix of 0.5 M nitric acid. When performed in-line with ICP-MS, the rapid analyte release from the electrode is fast, and large transient analyte signal enhancements of >100 fold can be achieved as compared to more conventional continuous nebulization of the original starting solution. This makes the approach ideal for very low level isotope ratio measurements. In this paper, some aspects of EMS performance are described. These include low level Pu isotope ratio behavior versus concentration by MC-ICP-MS and uranium rejection characteristics that are also important for reliable low level Pu isotope ratio determinations.

• Research Organization: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (US)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• DOE Contract Number: AC05-76RL01830
• OSTI ID: 1004522
• Report Number(s): PNNL-SA-73342; NN2001000
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
ACTINIDES
ELECTRODES
IONIZATION
ISOTOPE RATIO
MASS SPECTROSCOPY
NITRIC ACID
NUCLEAR MATERIALS MANAGEMENT
PERFORMANCE
PLASMA
PLUTONIUM
TRANSIENTS
URANIUM
VALIDATION