Method to determine low levels of HTO in air

The aim of this paper is to describe a handy method collecting and determining small amounts of tritium in air as HTO by using a collector with molecular sieves. The measurements in laboratory and field conditions showed a high retention capacity of the molecular sieves (>90%) for water vapours in air. Due to the high effectiveness of molecular sieves in absorbing the water vapours in air, even small amounts of HTO existing in air could be captured and prepared in liquid scintillator to be measured by β-spectrometry. (author) 2 figs., 2 tabs., 10 refs