April 19, 2005
First Radioactive Experiments Performed at the INE-Beamline
The first radioactive experiments have been performed at the INE-Beamline at the synchrotron source ANKA (Angstromquelle Karlsruhe). The INE-Beamline has been constructed by the Institut für Nukleare Entsorgung (INE) at the Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe (FZK), Germany. Professor Thomas Fanghänel, director of INE, comments, “This is a big step forward for actinide research especially in Europe.”
The unique aspect of the INE-Beamline is that it is in close proximity to INE’s active laboratories on the FZK site, with all necessary infrastructure for working with radioactive samples and well-equipped with state-of-the-art spectroscopic (notably laser-based) and analytical techniques. This is singular in all of Europe.
The INE-Beamline is dedicated to actinide research, with emphasis placed on spectroscopic speciation investigations related to nuclear waste disposal. The set-up and instrumentation at the INE-Beamline will allow investigations providing a molecular understanding of processes determinant in the fate of radionuclides released from repository waste, notably the actinides. Such information is essential to ensure sound long term safety assessment of proposed repositories.
A number of methods (XAFS, surface sensitive and spatial resolved techniques) are possible on one and the same sample at the INE-Beamline, with X-ray energies from below the 2.4 keV (S K edge) to 23.2 keV (Rh K edge). Investigations on nuclides with activities up to 106 times the exemption limit inside a safe and flexible containment within two layers of protection are possible. This amount of activity allows experiments on samples containing, e.g., more than 25 mg long-lived nuclide 237-Np, 242-Pu, 243-Am, or 248-Cm. A special protocol for working with radioactive samples at the INE-Beamline exists and must be adhered to. Standardized sample holders for transmission and fluorescence measurements on radioactive and non-radioactive samples, as well specialized sample chambers for, e.g., grazing incidence investigations, are available.
Installation of beamline components was completed in October 2003. Commissioning of the INE-beamline officially began in January 2004 and first X-ray absorption spectra were recorded the following August. The first spectrum (Am L3 edge XAFS) of a radioactive sample containing ~80 µg Am-243 sorbed onto amorphous Fe(III) oxy/hydroxide was recorded on 17. February 2005, the same day on which all formal requirements for the INE-Beamline license for working with radioactivity were fulfilled.
The INE-Beamline is now available to the international community for performing synchrotron-based X-ray research on radioactive samples with activities up to 106 times the limit of exemption. Access to the instrumentation at the INE-Beamline is possible through cooperation with INE (contact 
), through its use as a ‘Pooled facility’ of the EU European Network of Excellence for Actinide Sciences (ACTINET), and through the general user proposal system at ANKA.
Source:
Melissa DENECKE
