Presentation
Radon-222 is a radioactive noble gas derived from the decay chain of uranium-238 and thorium-232 in the earth’s crust. Once emitted into the atmosphere from the ground, radon is subject to the processes of advection and diffusion. Its radioactive half-life of 3.8 days makes it an excellent tracer of continental air mass, bearing in mind that radon emissions from oceans can be neglected (100 times lower than from continents).
The ICOS-RAMCES team analyzes radon at AMS, TRN, OPE, PUY, SAC, PDM and FKL stations. Historically, radon was measured using the active deposition method, which analyzed its short-lived progeny (218Po, 214Bi, 214Po and 212Po) accumulated for one hour on a filter. This measurement method is gradually being replaced by ANSTO dual-filter analyzers, enabling direct detection of 222Rn.
