Seeking Advice on Using Probe for EPMA for Radioactive Samples

[MelissaJDrignon]

Hello everyone,

The UNLV RadChem group, who regularly work with our SEMs, is interested in beginning to use our EPMA (JEOL ISP-100) for the characterization of radioactive materials. The electron microscopy laboratory and the RadChem group already have established safety procedures and controls in place to ensure the safety of users, the laboratory environment, and the instrumentation.

I wanted to reach out to the Probe for EPMA community to ask for any advice, recommendations, or lessons learned from those who have experience analyzing radioactive samples using EPMA.

At this stage, I believe the RadChem group is primarily interested in analyzing uranium and technetium metals that likely contain impurities and have been used for diffusion experiments. I would appreciate any guidance regarding specific considerations within Probe for EPMA that should be taken into account when working with these types of materials.

Are there any recommended software options or settings that should be considered during any stage of the analysis? Are there particular workflow considerations or precautions that you would recommend? I am interested in any potential concerns related to unusual beam interactions, sample behavior under the electron beam, background measurements, standard selection, spectrometer settings, or data processing that may be important when analyzing radioactive materials.

I would greatly appreciate any recommendations, experiences, or suggestions from anyone who has worked with radioactive materials using EPMA and Probe for EPMA, including any lessons learned or things that should be avoided.

Thank you very much for your guidance and support.
Best,
Melissa.

[John Donovan]

I wanted to reach out to the Probe for EPMA community to ask for any advice, recommendations, or lessons learned from those who have experience analyzing radioactive samples using EPMA.

At this stage, I believe the RadChem group is primarily interested in analyzing uranium and technetium metals that likely contain impurities and have been used for diffusion experiments. I would appreciate any guidance regarding specific considerations within Probe for EPMA that should be taken into account when working with these types of materials.

Are there any recommended software options or settings that should be considered during any stage of the analysis? Are there particular workflow considerations or precautions that you would recommend? I am interested in any potential concerns related to unusual beam interactions, sample behavior under the electron beam, background measurements, standard selection, spectrometer settings, or data processing that may be important when analyzing radioactive materials.

I would greatly appreciate any recommendations, experiences, or suggestions from anyone who has worked with radioactive materials using EPMA and Probe for EPMA, including any lessons learned or things that should be avoided.

Hi Melissa,
I don't have any experience working with radioactive materials, though several members on this forum do. I would only like to point out this topic regarding EPMA quantification of isotopes using Probe for EPMA:

https://smf.probesoftware.com/index.php?topic=1660.msg12767#msg12767

[jtmitchell]

My lab was recently used for some very low dose radioactive material and there didn't seem to be any issues. Definitely check in with the service engineers for the instrument if you haven't already to make sure the dose means they can still safely work on it in the future!

[jon_wade]

Mike Matthews did his PhD on this with Stu and Ben at Bristol (I was examiner and very good it was too!). Think this is the thesis link:

https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/studentTheses/field-emission-gun-electron-probe-microanalysis-of-radioactive-ma/