Assessment of intake of 210Po and 210Pb isotopes from cow's milk in Poland.

Milk has been known for its nutritional properties for centuries and is often the staple of the diet in many countries. Therefore, monitoring of milk composition seems to be a relevant task as it was the purpose of this study to compare levels of 210Po and 210Pb in several Polish voivodeships. The methodology was based on mineralization, loss on an inorganic matrix and concentration measurement on an alpha spectrometer. The concentrations of 210Po and 210Pb in collected milk samples were measured using alpha spectrometry and calculations, respectively. The results showed that the lowest concentration of 210Po is 2.8 ± 0.2 mBq l-1 and the highest is 56.3 ± 0.7 mBq l-1 while the 210Pb concentrations are in the range from 2.8 ± 0.2 to 44.0 ± 1.7 mBq l-1. The associated annual effective doses for adults jmrange from 3.5 ± 0.1 to 11.0 ± 0.2 µSv a-1 for 210Po and from 2.0 ± 0.1 to 5.0 ± 0.1 µSv a-1 for 210Pb. The lowest doses were noticed in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship and the highest values were found in Lesser Poland Voivodeship. The results show that the annual effective dose in individual provinces is not dangerous to health. However, there are significant differences between highly and lowly industrialized voivodeships.

Radioactivity of honey in central and southern Poland.

In 2017, the Polish public consumed on average 0.61 kg of honey, while the European average consumption was 0.7 kg (Data on honey consumption in Poland, 2014) [http://www.portalspozywczy.pl]. The main point of this study was to investigate the 210Po activity concentrations in different types of floral and non-floral honey, type of clad honey is made of and honey yield in honey available on the Polish market. Activity of 210 Po in honey ranged from 0.006 ± 0.001 to 0.384 ± 0.004 Bq kg-1 with effective dose 0.005 ± 0.001 to 0.281 ± 0.003 µSv/year. The activity in honey was measured by alpha-spectrometry. The concentration of radionuclide depends on the raw material used by bees and plant type. The highest concentration of 210Po was observed in the honeydew honey and herbal honey.

210Po in popular medicinal herbs from Poland.

Herbs are an important part of traditional medicine in Poland. Therefore, the aim of this study was the determination of polonium 210Po in 48 selected medicinal herb samples from the Polish market. The activity concentrations of 210Po were measured using alpha spectrometry. The activity concentration of 210Po was in the range from 0.3 ± 0.1 to 28.2 ± 0.4 Bq kg-1. The obtained results were compared with corresponding studies conducted worldwide. A higher 210Po activity concentration was observed in the above-ground part of plants. The obtained results show that the highest 210Po activity concentration was observed in evergreen plants and winter-hardy plants. Yet even infusions with 2 g of the most contaminated herbs examined were considered to be radiologically safe.

Lichens and mosses as polonium and uranium biomonitors on Sobieszewo Island.

In the study the activities of polonium 210Po and uranium 234U, 238U radionuclides in moss and lichen samples were determined using the alpha spectrometry. Different lichens and mosses were collected around the Sobieszewo Island (northern Poland) and investigated for potential use as biomonitors for 210Po and 238U deposition. Mosses and lichens have a high efficiency in capturing 210Po and 238U from atmospheric fallout. The obtained results showed that 210Po, 238U concentrations are changing in analyzed thallophytes samples depending on the type of thallus.

210Po secretion from sweat glands.

The results of the research indicated that the 210Po activity concentration in sweat samples was between 0.22 ± 0.03 to 2.10 ± 0.15 mBq·g-1 d.w. The obtained results of the studies showed that smoking and eating fish led to higher activity concentrations of 210Po in sweat in comparison to the control group. Statistical analysis of 210Po activity concentrations in sweat samples showed significant differences between control, smoking, fish eating and age groups, while no significant differences was found for 210Po between volunteers as far as gender is concerned.

Polonium 210Po activities in human blood of patients with ischaemic heart disease from Gdansk in Poland.

The determination of polonium 210Po in human blood samples is presented and discussed in this paper. The human blood samples were collected from patients of Medical University of Gdansk with ischaemic heart disease (morbus ischaemicus cordis, MIC). The polonium concentrations in analyzed human blood samples are very differentiated. 210Po is of particular interest in public health and although is present in the environment in extremely low amounts, it is easily bioaccumulated to the human body. The study shows that the amount of 210Po that is incorporated into the human body depends on the food habits and some difference in its levels could be observed between smokers and non-smokers.