Influence of rock type and geophysical properties on radon flux density

The most significant source of human exposure to ionizing radiation is the radioactive gas radon (basically 222 Rn) and its daughter decay products, creating more than half of the effective dose from all natural sources. Radon enters buildings mainly from dense rocks, which are below building founda...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Radiation and environmental biophysics 2024-05, Vol.63 (2), p.271-281
Main Authors: Ryzhakova, N. K., Stavitskaya, K. O., Plastun, S. A.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biological and Medical Physics
Biophysics
Building construction
Buildings
Clay
Ecosystems
Effects of Radiation/Radiation Protection
Environmental Physics
Exhalation
Fluctuations
Flux density
Foundations
Geological Phenomena
Geophysics
Gravel
Ionizing radiation
Limestone
Loam
Methods
Moisture content
Monitoring/Environmental Analysis
Permeability
Physics
Physics and Astronomy
Radiation
Radiation Monitoring - methods
Radon
Radon - analysis
Rock properties
Rocks
Sandy loam
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Summary:The most significant source of human exposure to ionizing radiation is the radioactive gas radon (basically 222 Rn) and its daughter decay products, creating more than half of the effective dose from all natural sources. Radon enters buildings mainly from dense rocks, which are below building foundations at depths of 1 m and more. In this paper long-term measurements of radon flux density are analyzed, with radon exhalation from the surface of the most common rocks—loams, sandy loams, clays, clay shales, several types of sandy-gravel-pebble deposits, clay and rocky limestone. The influence of geophysical properties of rocks on radon flux density due to exhalation from surfaces of those rocks was studied. Based on the results obtained, a method of local assessment of the hazard from radon and its progeny in buildings is proposed, which is based on the geophysical properties of rocks below the foundations of those buildings.
ISSN:0301-634X
1432-2099
1432-2099
DOI:10.1007/s00411-024-01067-2