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Radiation Protection Dosimetry Advance Access originally published online on October 20, 2008
Radiation Protection Dosimetry 2008 132(1):88-93; doi:10.1093/rpd/ncn253
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Environmental gamma radiation measurement in District Swat, Pakistan

T. Jabbar1, K. Khan1, M. S. Subhani2,*, P. Akhter1 and A. Jabbar1

1 Health Physics Division, PINSTECH, Nilore, Islamabad, Pakistan
2 Department of Environmental Sciences, Federal Urdu University, Islamabad

* Corresponding author: sadiqsubhani{at}yahoo.com

Received July 14, 2008, amended September 11, 2008, accepted September 13, 2008

External exposure to environmental gamma ray sources is an important component of exposure to the public. A survey was carried out to determine activity concentration levels and associated doses from 226Ra, 232Th, 40K and 137Cs by means of high-resolution gamma ray spectrometry in the Swat district, famous for tourism. The mean concentrations for 226Ra, 232Th and 40K were found to be 50.4 ± 0.7, 34.8 ± 0.7 and 434.5 ± 7.4 Bq kg–1, respectively, in soil samples, which are slightly more than the world average values. However, 137Cs was only found in the soil sample of Barikot with an activity concentration of 34 ± 1.2 Bq kg–1. Only 40K was determined in vegetation samples with an average activity of 172.2 ± 1.7 Bq kg–1, whereas in water samples, all radionuclides were found below lower limits of detection. The radium equivalent activity in all soil samples is lower than the limit set in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development report (370 Bq kg–1). The value of the external exposure dose has been determined from the content of these radionuclides in soil. The average terrestrial gamma air absorbed dose rate was observed to be 62.4 nGy h–1, which yields an annual effective dose of 0.08 mSv. The average value of the annual effective dose lies close to the global range of outdoor radiation exposure given in United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation. However, the main component of the radiation dose to the population residing in the study area arises from cosmic ray due to high altitude.


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