• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.319-328
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• 2005

This paper describes a compartment dynamic model for evaluating the contamination level of kritium in agricultural plants exposed by accidentally released tritium. The present model uses a time-dependent growth equation of plant so that it can predict the effect of growth stage of plant during the exposure time. The model including atmosphere, soil and plant compartments is described by a set of nonlinear ordinary differential equations, and is able to predict time-dependent concentrations of tritium in the compartments. To validate the model, a series of exposure experiments of HTO vapor on Chinese cabbage and radish was carried out at the different growth stage of each plant. At the end of exposure, the tissue free water(TFWT) and the organically bound tritium(OBT) were measured. The measured concentrations were agreed well with model predictions.

• Proceedings of the Korean Nuclear Society Conference
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• 2002.05a
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• pp.411.1-411
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• 2002

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.45-54
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• 2005

A dynamic compartment model was developed to appraise the level of the contamination of agricultural plants by accidentally released tritium from nuclear facility. The model consists of a set of inter-connected compartments representing atmosphere, soil and plant. In the model three categories of plant are considered: leafy vegetables, grain plants and tuber plants, of which each is modeled separately to account for the different transport pathways of tritium. The predictive accuracy of the model was tested through the analysis of the tritium exposure experiments for rice-plants. The predicted TFWT(tissue free water tritium) concentration of the rice ear at harvest was greatly affected by the absolute humidity of air, the ratio of root uptake, and the rate of rainfall, while its OBT(organically bound tritium) concentration the stowing period of the ear, the absolute humidity of air and the content of hydrogen in the organic phase. There was a good agreement between the model prediction and the experimental results lot the OBT concentration of the ear.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.117-127
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• 2004

A dynamic compartment model was developed to evaluate the transport of accidently released radionuclides onto rice-fields. In the model, the surface water compartment and shoot-base absorption were introduced to account for the effect of irrigation, which is essential to a rice cultivation. The soil mixing by plough and irrigation before transplanting rice was also considered, and the rate of root-uptake and shoot-base absorption were modeled in terms of the function of biomass. In order to test the validation of the model, it was applied to the analysis of some simulated $^{137}Cs$ deposition experiments that were performed while cultivating rice in a greenhouse using soils sampled from rice-fields around Kori, Yonggwang and Ulchin nuclear power plants. The model prediction was generally agreed within about one order of magnitude with experimental data.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2003

The periodic safety review of operational nuclear power plants requires that the plants should keep a well organized environmental monitoring program. The past records of environment monitoring data were analyzed. and the tritium concentrations of the samples in the surface and ground water around Kori site were measured. It was shown that the tritium concentrations around the Kori site were slightly higher than that of natural background. The change of background tritium concentration was estimated through a numerical modeling. Two different versions of 7 compartments model - the world and the northern hemisphere - defined in NCRP-62 were modeled for the global tritium cycling. The numerical solution of the model was obtained using a computer program, AMBER. The four cases of tritium source-terms into the atmosphere were considered. The results showed that the tritium concentration in the surface soil water was higher than that in sea water or surface stream water. Also, it was shown that the tritium produced by the interaction between cosmic rays and the gases were the major source of tritium, and the tritium produced by nuclear weapon test decreased considerably.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.365-372
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• 2006

A dynamic compartment model is presented to predict the contamination level of agricultural plant by $^{137}C_s$ as a result of a soil deposition. The model considered the processes of a percolation, soil mixing by a plowing before transplanting, plant uptake, leaching to a deep soil, and fixation to a clay mineral. The effects of the soil properties (pH, clay mineral, organic matter content, and exchangeable K), which are spatially varied, on a plant uptake and the leaching rates of $^{137}C_s$ in a root zone soil were modeled by the Absalom model. To test the validity of the model, the $^{137}C_s$ aggregated transfer factors(TFa) for rice plants were compared with those observed from some simulated $^{137}C_s$ soil deposition experiments, which were carried out with respect to rice plants cultivated in seventeen paddy soils of different properties for two consecutive years. Observed $^{137}C_s$ TFa values of the rice plants did not show an evident trend for the pH and clay content of the soil properties, while they increased with an increasing organic matter content or a decreasing exchangeable K concentration. Predicted $^{137}C_s$ TFa values of the rice plants were found to be comparable with those observed.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.135-141
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• 2008

This paper describes a dynamic compartment model to predict the time-dependent $^{14}C$ activity in a plant as a result of a direct exposure to an amount of $^{14}CO_2$ for a short period of time, and experimental results for the model validation. In the model, the plant consists of two compartments of the body and ears, and five carbon fluxes between the compartments, which are the function of parameters relating to the growth and photosynthesis of a plant, are considered. Model predictions were made for an investigation into the effects of the exposure time, the elapsed exposure time, and the model parameters on the $^{14}C$ radioactivity of a plant. The present model converged to a region where the specific activity model is applicable when the elapsed time of the exposure was extended up to the harvest time of a plant. The $^{14}C$ activity of a plant was predicted to be the greatest when the exposure had happened in the period between the flowering and ears-maturity on account of the most vigorous photosynthesis rate for the period. Comparison of model predictions with the observed 14C radioactivity of rice plants showed that the present model could predict the $^{14}C$ radioactivity of the rice plants reasonably well.