Study on uptake of ¹³⁷Cs and ⁴⁰K by mangrove leaves at Mumbai Harbour Bay

All living things in the environment are exposed to natural and fallout radioactivity. Mumbai Harbour Bay (MHB), a natural deep-water harbour receives treated effluents from industrial establishments and domestic wastes from urban settlements. The ecology of MHB is mangrove vegetation which protects shorelines from damaging storm, hurricane winds, waves, floods and prevents erosion by stabilising sediment. The sediment acts as a sink for the radionuclides which results in the uptake of them by flora and fauna due to biological processes as well as various physico-chemical parameters like pH, clay mineral content, organic matter, cation exchange capacity. In the present study, the transfer factor (TF) and discrimination factor (DF) for ⁴⁰K and ¹³⁷Cs was computed to understand the efficiency of the plant to absorb the element(s) from sediment