The Use of Beryllium-7 as a Tracer In-Depth Penetration Study
Abstract:
This paper aims to study the depth penetration into the soil surface by Fallout Radionuclides (FRNs) as tracers. This approach is still not widely used in soil penetration studies until now and Beryllium-7 is used entirely as a short-term tracer in this study. Thus, in order to confirm the use of this tracer, a study was conducted in the catchment area of Timah Tasoh, Perlis which was selected as study site for both the rainy and dry seasons. This study involves taking soil samples by using a metal corer and taken to the Radiochemistry and Environment Laboratory (RAS), Nuclear Malaysia to carry out further procedures such as the preparation and finally the analysis data obtained from the analysis using Gamma Spectrometry counting system, consists of Hyper-Germanium detector (HPGe). Based on the analysis results shown in table 1, the depth penetration values in the study site area of Timah Tasoh has given different results as a whole for two seasons. The distribution of soil depth profile onto the soil surface or ho values are varying between 2.98 - 4.98 kgm-2 and 3.57 - 5.57 kgm-2 for dry and wet seasons, respectively. The value from this study is also not much different in the value of depth penetration distribution with some study that has been carried out by other. As a conclusion, Beryllium-7 which acts as a short-term tracer has been successfully used to determine the value of depth penetration into the soil surface in different seasons study.
