Development of in-situ measurement for 90Sr specific activity by β-ray survey meter combined with sensitivity correction by Monte Carlo calculation

The objective of this study was to develop an in-situ measurement technique for the instant detection of the 90Sr contamination. A numerical method to correct the detection efficiency of the β survey meter was applied for an elk antler sample from the vicinity of the Mayak facility. The estimated 90Sr specific activity of 0.21±0.04 Bq/g agrees within the factor of two to the value 0.11±0.06 Bq/g evaluated with the imaging plate, which was previously validated. Also, the dependence of the detection efficiency was shown to be an exponential function of the sample thickness and nearly proportional to the area of the sample.