title: Matrix materials for proficiency testing: optimization of a procedure for spiking soil with gamma-emitting radionuclides.
abstract: The IAEA Reference Materials Group of the Chemistry Unit, Agency's Laboratories Seibersdorf, has developed and optimized a procedure for spiking some environmental matrices with gamma-emitting radionuclides. This paper describes the spiking procedure, homogeneity testing of the spiked material, and assignment of property values and their associated uncertainties for the radionuclides 54Mn, 65Zn, 60Co, 109Cd, 134Cs, 137Cs, 210Pb, and 241Am. This procedure has already been successfully used in an IAEA proficiency test on the determination of 137Cs and 210Pb in spiked soil and has been found to be appropriate for production of soil materials for proficiency testing and internal quality control samples. The main advantage of this procedure is a low uncertainty arising from heterogeneity, which was found to be less than 1.2% for all the analytes studied.
authors.affiliation: International Atomic Energy Agency, Agency's Laboratories Seibersdorf, 1400, Vienna, Austria.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Shakhashiro
authors.forename: A M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Gondin da Fonseca Azeredo
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Sansone
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fajgelj