Disproportionately High Contributions of 60 Year Old Weapons-137Cs Explain the Persistence of Radioactive Contamination in Bavarian Wild Boars

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Stäger, F.; Zok, D.; Schiller, A.-K.; Feng, B.; Steinhauser, G.: Disproportionately High Contributions of 60 Year Old Weapons-137Cs Explain the Persistence of Radioactive Contamination in Bavarian Wild Boars. In: Environmental Science & Technology 57 (2023), Nr. 36, S. 13601-13611. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.3c03565

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To cite the version in the repository, please use this identifier: https://doi.org/10.15488/16266

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Radionuclides released from nuclear accidents or explosions pose long-term threats to ecosystem health. A prominent example is wild boar contamination in central Europe, which is notorious for its persistently high 137Cs levels. However, without reliable source identification, the origin of this decades old problem has been uncertain. Here, we target radiocesium contamination in wild boars from Bavaria. Our samples (2019-2021) range from 370 to 15,000 Bq·kg-1137Cs, thus exceeding the regulatory limits (600 Bq·kg-1) by a factor of up to 25. Using an emerging nuclear forensic fingerprint, 135Cs/137Cs, we distinguished various radiocesium source legacies in their source composition. All samples exhibit signatures of mixing of Chornobyl and nuclear weapons fallout, with 135Cs/137Cs ratios ranging from 0.67 to 1.97. Although Chornobyl has been widely believed to be the prime source of 137Cs in wild boars, we find that “old” 137Cs from weapons fallout significantly contributes to the total level (10-68%) in those specimens that exceeded the regulatory limit. In some cases, weapons-137Cs alone can lead to exceedances of the regulatory limit, especially in samples with a relatively low total 137Cs level. Our findings demonstrate that the superposition of older and newer legacies of 137Cs can vastly surpass the impact of any singular yet dominant source and thus highlight the critical role of historical releases of 137Cs in current environmental pollution challenges.
License of this version: CC BY 4.0 Unported
Document Type: Article
Publishing status: publishedVersion
Issue Date: 2023
Appears in Collections:Fakultät für Mathematik und Physik

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1 image of flag of United States United States 6 40.00%
2 image of flag of Germany Germany 6 40.00%
3 image of flag of No geo information available No geo information available 1 6.67%
4 image of flag of Indonesia Indonesia 1 6.67%
5 image of flag of Spain Spain 1 6.67%

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