The field of nuclear forensics and safeguards has seen increased importance in recent years. In particular, particle analysis has been an increasingly important component of these fields. In nuclear forensics, a specimen can be analyzed using a number of different techniques to narrow down its possible origin. The development of new, non-destructive analysis tools are an important part of refining this process to yield more accurate results. X-ray probes are a promising non-destructive method of providing additional information about specimens, particularly chemical speciation, which is not typically currently examined. To this end, prior work done using a Scanning Transmission X-ray Microscope (STXM) has shown that soft X-ray Absorption Spectroscopy (XAS) has demonstrated the ability to distinguish between many different uranium species, offering an opportunity to provide important information on a sample's origin. Current efforts are focused on improving a particle identification method by providing additional elemental and chemical information through x-ray fluorescence, as well as improving throughput to analyze particles more quickly.

Synchrotron X-ray techniques for nuclear forensics and safeguards particle analysis

ACS Spring Meeting 2021

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.