ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY, VOL. 51, NO. 12, OCTOBER 1979
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Table 111. Concentration Range of Plutonium in Different Organs (Man), pCi/kg wet weight 2 39,:40 2 3 8 PUG organs Pu lung lymph nodes liver
bone (vertebrae) other soft tissues
0.10-0.22 0.5 2-1.1 0.18-5.9 0.13-0.28 0.001-0.75
1981
ACKNOWLEDGMENT The authors thank James W. Neton for a few plutonium determinations and Helen Ford for her technical assistance.
LITERATURE CITED 0.04-0.12
a 2 s 8 Pcould ~ not be detected in other organs. The concentration range of plutonium is given in Table 111. The error associated with the determination of 239,240Pu in lung, liver, and bone was generally 10-207~ because of the large sample size, and higher concentration of plutonium than other organs. However, the error was much higher (20-100%) in kidney, spleen, thyroid, and gonads where the concentration of plutonium was very low and the sample size was very small. The results lower than 0.01 pCi/kg showed 200-300% error. Plutonium-238 could not be determined with any reasonable degree of confidence in any tissue except liver. In liver the concentration ranged from 0.04 to 0.12 pCi/kg with an uncertainty of 10-5070. The implications of the concentrations and accumulations of thorium and plutonium in human tissues in terms of biochemical behavior and radiation dosimetry have not been discussed here because the nature of the subject is beyond the scope of this paper.
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RECEIVED for review March 6, 1979. Accepted
