Application of a new nuclear method for the localization of uranium

The International Atomic Energy Agency regarded one of the most important tasks to develop a new uranium localization method which can be used for the identification of deep situated places of occurrences. The Ore Mining Company in Mecsek and the Nuclear Research Institute in Debrecen developed a new process based on the measurement of radonanomalies by α sensitive solid state track detectors. Rn-222 gas releasing from the decay process of U-238 emits α-rays. Having not very short half life (3.8 day) it is able to reveal the presence of uranium in deeper layers (100 m under the ground). Large number of plastic track detectors situated on the given land count the α particles during a long exposion time. Problems like this cannot be solved by the traditional scintillation detectors. The process is simple and cheap. (V.N.)