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Welcome back my fellow radiation nerds! Today we will be taking a closer look at a one of the most dangerous radioactive isotopes that iso famous for the “Drop & Run” phrase. As you might have guessed by now, we will be talking about the radioactivity and uses of Cobalt 60!

Element Cobalt

The element Cobalt is a rather interesting one, humans have been using it unknowingly for centuries and it has only been officially “discovered” in 1735 by a Swedish chemist and mineralogist, Georg Brandt. The discovery of Cobalt was a major milestone for science, as it was the first metal discovered since the ancient times that wasn’t one of the seven metals of antiquity!

In its raw form, Cobalt is a hard, brittle, silvery-blue metal with atomic number of 27. In nature it has only one isotope, Co-59 which is stable. Cobalt is naturally magnetic and plays a crucial role in the production of magnets and batteries used in all modern electronics. Thanks to its very high melting point of 1495°C, Cobalt is a primary ingredient in production of superalloys used in jet engines.

While Cobalt can be found many places around the globe, it only really exists in trace amounts and there are only few location on earth where mining Cobalt is economically viable. Today, over 70% of Cobalt supply comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo and since the demand for this element only continues to grow due to the rise of Electric Vehicles and modern consumer electronics, the country has become a subject of numerous human rights violations including child labour, dangerous and unregulated working conditions and corruption.

Furthermore, the Democratic Republic of Congo’s vast mineral wealth and geopolitical significance have made it a focal point for many foreign governments and non-state actors alike who continue to fight over its natural resource control both politically and militarily.

As a result, the Democratic Republic of Congo, despite having an estimated $25 Trillion in untapped minerals, remains one of the poorest countries on earth.

The radioactive isotopes of Cobalt

Cobalt 60 is probably the most well known radioactive isotope of Cobalt. It is produced by neutron irradiation of stable Cobalt 59 in nuclear reactors and it was synthesised for the very first time in 1937 by John J. Livingood and Green T. Seaborg at the Berkeley National Laboratory. Co-60 has a half-life of 5.3 years and it decays via beta emission into stable Ni-60 and in the process, it also releases two gamma rays in rapid succession at 1173 keV and 1332 keV.

Co-60’s high energy gamma rays make it a suitable isotope for various applications including radiotherapy, sterilisation of medical equipment and in well logging devices. In all those cases, a very high activity industrial sources are used but Cobalt 60 was also used in smaller amounts for example in electronics where it was added to vacuum tubes to improve ionisation and their reliability. Since Cobalt 60 is a widely used in many industries and is also present in nuclear fallout, it is sometimes used for calibration of radiation detectors though Cs-137 is much more common for that purpose.

Cobalt-60 is also known for the famous phrase “Drop and Run” which was engraved on some industrial sources which were use for sterilisation of medical equipment. In order to achieve efficient dose rate for that purpose, these sources used jaw dropping 131 TBq of Co-60 per source making them incredibly dangerous if handled incorrectly. Kyle Hill made a fantastic video on them which I highly recommend you watch, after finishing this video .

In the 1950s, physicist Leo Szilard proposed a concept for a Cobalt bomb. Essentially was a regular nuclear weapon but added Cobalt 59. During the detonation, neutrons released from the fission of U-235/Pu-239 would activate stable Cobalt 59 turning it into radioactive Cobalt 60. This would result in the fallout being far more radioactive than from normal nuclear explosion and would make the area uninhabitable for decades. A few countries consider this idea including US, UK and Soviet Union, however none of them ended up creating a functional dirty bomb.

Cobalt has a few other radioactive synthetic isotopes but they all have short half-lives and they don’t see much use outside of scientific field.

My Cobalt 60 sources

Today finding a sample of Co-60 is rather tricky. As mentioned before, Co-60 has a half-life of 5.3 years which makes many of the old sources barely detectable if at all today. Of course we are talking about ones that are safe to handle and not the industrial ones.

Probably your best shot today is getting one from Spectrum Techniques. While they are a solid option, they are already a bit pricy and if you live outside of US, additional shipping and import fees will at least double or triple the original price. So if you are like me, you are probably stuck hunting for a vintage tube or a meter that had Co-60 source.

A few years back I bought a vintage Bomac 1B63A tube in hopes of using it as a Co-60 source. I read online that it originally contained <1uCi of Co-60 which was used to “pre-ionise” the gas inside the tube. Unfortunately the tube was manufactured in a long time ago and all of the Co-60 has decayed and today there is absolutely zero activity left. While I do think that the tube is an interesting item to have in my collection, it left me still craving a Co-60 source that would actually be still detectable.

A few weeks back, I met with a friend, who is also a passionate science nerd. During our conversation I mentioned that one isotope I just can’t find and I really want in my collection is Co-60. After hearing that, he gifted me his source of Co-60, so I want to thank him again for it and for inspiring and making this video possible!

As I was writing this video, I spotted a local classifieds listing for a Polish RK-67 Geiger counter. The meter itself isn’t anything to really write home about but when I saw that it came with not one but two Co-60 sources and full documentation, it was a pretty much an instant buy for me.

All three of these sources have been manufactured by the Polish Institute of Nuclear Science (IBJ – Instytut Badań Jądrowych) and they came included with some polish radiation meters. Originally they had an activity of around 18.5 kBq (0.5uCi) but due to their age, most of the activity is now long gone so even if you’re able to find one, it will only read fraction of the original activity, assuming it wont not be fully decayed.

Measuring the sources

So what do these sources measure today? For measuring the activity I will use my SE International Ranger as it uses a very sensitive LND7317 Geiger tube which is a standard for profesional devices. For measuring the gamma dose rate, I will use my RAYSID as it calculates accurate dose rate based on the gamma energy detected. Since the sources have pretty low activity, I will take measurements at contact and not 1 cm distance as I usually do. I will also take them inside my lead castle to minimise any measurement error caused by fluctuations in background radiation.

Source #1

First up is the Co-60 source I got from a friend of mine. The top layer with all the marking, unfortunately has been sanded down so I have no way to determine from which year the source is. The activity while low, is detectable and I was able to measure 244 CPM over background with my Ranger. When measured with my RAYSID I got increase of 31 CPS and 0.50 uSv/h.

Source #2

Next source is the a slightly pink one that came with the RK-67 meter. Unfortunately the activity is quite a bit lower than the first source. I measured an increase of 89 CPM over background on the SE International Ranger, while my RAYSID measured 8.3 CPS and 0.14 uSv/h.

Source #3

The last source is unfortunately also the least active one and I was able to only measure 20 CPM on my Ranger and 1.4 CPS and 0.02uSv/h on the RAYSID. This source is practically down to its last few atoms decaying and it really doesn’t have much life left in it…

While none of these sources measured particularly high, they are suitable for gamma spectroscopy assuming you have big enough crystal and high quality lead castle. These sources will be still detectable for few years but eventually they will lose all their activity which gives me probably some time to save up and get a fresh 1uCi source from Spectrum Techniques which should last me for the foreseeable future.

Summary

Exploring the radioactivity and uses of Co-60 was really fascinating and I have certainly learned a lot about it. I want to hear from you, do you have any Co-60 samples in your collection and how active are they? I’m looking forward to your answers int he comments below!

If you enjoyed this article, feel free to support my work over on Patreon: patreon.com/allRadioactive

Feel free to also check out my YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@allRadioactive

Cobalt 60 Youtube Video:

Welcome back my fellow radiation nerds, Today we will take a closer look at a budget Bicron scintillator probe and whether it is any good.

What’s the deal with this detector?

The detector we will be covering today is the Bicron 1.12×1.12M3/1.12L (P/N I600-2265). What really caught my attention, is that those scintillators can be found for dirt cheap, often way below 100 euros making them one of the most affordable scintillation probes on the market.

Originally they have been designed for use in portal monitors, which is why these detectors have a quirky, cubic design, and the cable awkwardly sticks out to the side. Since I wasn’t a fan of that, I modified my unit by adding a BNC connector at the back. It was a pretty simple mod, and if you decide to do it for yourself, be sure to properly seal back the detector to prevent any light leaks, as they will permanently damage the photomultiplier tube resulting in the failure of the detector.

However what “counts”, is what is inside and that is a 1.12×1.12×3 inch, NaI(Tl) crystal making the probe very sensitive to gamma radiation resulting in background alone being at around 5-10k CPM. The operating voltage should be between 600V and 1000V and personally I’ve been running the scintillator at 650V without any problems and recently started to use it at 900V so that I can quickly swap out between the scintillator and my 44-9 pancake probe and I haven’t had any issues.

The extra sensitivity of the detector came in handy during my recent trip to the military aviation museum in Berlin, where I could easily pick up Radium dials in the airplanes from even a few meters away.

I’ve also took it on my recent Uranium prospecting trip and it performed fantastically being able to detect rocks buried deep underground, which I wouldn’t be able to find with a traditional geiger counter.

One downside of this detector is that it might be sometimes too sensitive. As mentioned before, the background alone is between 5-10k CPM, which makes only the x10 and x100 scale usable on my Ludlum Model 3 and hot rocks like the ones I found during my trip, will quickly max out my meter. So while the detector did a great job at finding hot spots, I did end up using my RAYSID and BetterGeiger S-2 and S-2L for pin pointing the exact location of the rocks. One solution could be to run the scintillator at lower voltage, maybe around 500-550V which will lower its sensitivity and give a bit more headroom.

One interesting thing about many Bicron scintillators is that they have this weird potentiometer sticking out. It is basically a gain adjustment which allows to control how strong the output is. This doesn’t affect sensitivity but can be useful for gamma spectroscopy and slightly improve resolution.

Gamma Spectroscopy and resolution

Speaking of which, this scintillator is definitely a great tool for detecting radiation, but can it be used for gamma spectroscopy? So far I had chance to test 3 of those units with my Gamma Spectacular GS-PRO-V5 and the results varied drastically from being “ok” at 7.8%, to pretty much unusable at over 13% at 662 keV. It really is a gamble with those detectors and if spectroscopy is a priority for you, then I’d definitely recommend getting a higher-end probe for that purpose.

Summary

Overall the Bicron 1.12X1.12M3/1.12L detector is a real bargain and is definitely worth considering if you’re looking for decent scintillator that wont break the bank. It won’t produce amazing gamma spectra but for radiation detection, it performs fantastically!

I want to hear from you, do you have any scintillator probes in your collection? What do you use them for? Let me know, in the comments below!

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Thank you so much for reading this post, I hope you enjoyed it and learned something new! If yes, please make sure to subscribe to the email list so that you get notified when new posts are added. Also feel free to check out my Ko-Fi page where you can donate a nice cup of radioactive coffee and support my work financially.

and remember, stay active!

Adrianov’s Compass – Another Radioactive Artefact of the Cold War

Welcome back my fellow radiation nerds. Today we will take a look at another soviet, radioactive artefact from the Cold War, the Adrianov’s Compass!

The history of the compass

The Adrianov’s compass was designed by Vladimir Adrianov in 1907 for the Russian Imperial Army and since then, it served in various countries within the Warsaw Pact until it was eventually phased out in the late 1950s. Although originally intended for military use, the compass became widely adopted by scout groups and other paramilitary organisations.

These compasses used radium paint on the tips of the arrows and few other spots to make them glow in the dark, which also resulted in them being radioactive. Due to their old age, there is no visible glow left and under black light there is a little bit of green fluorescence but the radioactivity is easily detectable..

It is worth mentioning that only the models with metal bodies and orange paint on the arrows used radium. The ones with plastic, white bodies or without orange paint aren’t radioactive.

The built quality of the compass is very solid and there are no loose parts, which definitely helps with containing any bits of radium paints that might have fallen off. This being said, there is a little bit of radon gas leaking out.

On the back there is a logo of the factory in which the compass was manufactured and the year of production. Mine was made in 1956 by SZMO (Śląskie Zakłady Mechaniczno-Optyczne w Katowicach) in Katowice, Poland. Although it is 69 years old, it is still in a great visual condition.

Today these compasses can be easily found pretty cheaply at flea markets, especially in countries that were part of the Warsaw Pact.

Activity and gamma spectroscopy of the compass

When measured with My Ludlum Model 3 with a 44-9 probe, I got a reading of 10k CPM at 1cm distance. The thick glass blocks pretty much all alpha and beta radiation and if removed, the activity from the radium paint will easily max out my meter at over 500k CPM but I strongly advise against opening any items containing radium paint.

The gamma dose from the compass is approximately 5.50 uSv/h when measured with my RAYSID at 1cm distance.

A quick gamma spectroscopy showed clear peaks for Ra-226 and its decay chain.

A few last words

Through out the history, various militaries used countless radioactive items from radium painted watches, airplane gauges to even helmet markers and while those items are definitely great collectables for anyone fascinated with military equipment of the 20th century, it is important to remember to always handle such items with most care, as Radium is a particularly nasty element, and the paint can easily fall apart and contaminate anything it touches. Remember that safety always comes first.

I want to hear from you! Do you have any radioactive watches or compasses? What other radioactive items should I explore? Let me know in the comments below!

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Thank you so much for reading this post, I hope you enjoyed it and learned something new! If yes, please make sure to subscribe to the email list so that you get notified when new posts are added. Also feel free to check out my Ko-Fi page where you can donate a nice cup of radioactive coffee and support my work financially.

and remember, stay active!

Welcome back my fellow radiation nerds. Today we will explore the radioactivity and the nonsense of some more quantum science, scalar energy quackery items sold on Amazon!

If you enjoy this content make sure to subscribe to my channel so you don’t miss any of the upcoming uploads. Thanks and now back to the video.

In the past I explored the radioactivity of two “Quantum Energy” pendants. In both cases they have turned out to be radioactive due to the Thorium content. Since then, most of those listings have been removed but occasionally they do pop up every now and then on websites such as Amazon.

Recently I was browsing through the internet and I found some “quantum energy”, stickers which I haven’t really explored before, so I decided to order them, and see if they will be radioactive.

Sticker Nr.1

The first sticker was marketed as an anti radiation sticker that will protect the user from the “harmful” 5G radiation… Right. The definitely not photoshopped stock photos on the listing, recommend placing the stickers on all electrical devices such as phones, tablets, laptops and TVs…

Despite the stickers being marketed as anti radiation, I measured pretty decent radioactivity coming off of them. When measured from the front, I got a result of 250 CPM and 700 CPM when measured from the back of the sticker at 1cm distance, with my Ludlum Model 3 with a 44-9 probe. Im guessing that the silicon layer blocks some of the alpha and beta radiation resulting in lower activity from the front.

I was curious about how was the sticker constructed and which part in particular made it radioactive, so I used my trusty Swiss knife to peal its layers one by one and conducted a little autopsy of it.

The sticker is made of three parts, silicon top, shiny middle part and sticky brown layer at the bottom. After measuring each part separately I found that the brown bottom layer was the radioactive one.

Sticker Nr.2

The second sticker was marketed as advance technology, Scalar Energy, Energy Saver, Made in Japan anti radiation protection…

and surprise surprise, when measured with my Ludlum Model 3 with 44-9 probe, I got a reading of over 2000 CPM at 1 cm distance.

Gamma spectroscopy and analysis of radioactive isotopes inside the stickers

The two pendants I explored before contain radioactive Thorium 232 and I was curious if that will also be the case with these stickers. To find out, I conducted a gamma spectroscopy with my RAYSID gamma spectrometer which revealed that both of the stickers contained radioactive Thorium 232 and its decay products.

Thorium ore (Monazite) is pretty common in China, in fact it’s much more common there than uranium which is why China is currently investing heavily into Thorium breeder reactors. I’m assuming Thorium is a waste product of Monazite processing as Monazite is rich in several other rare earth elements but I have absolutely no idea why is it being added to those stickers… I guess it at least makes a pretty cool check source for all of us nuclear nerds?

While those stickers are a pretty cool and relatively safe source to handle, their marketing is very misleading and they should definitely not be sold on Amazon or similar websites under their current description. Just remember that, some people still believe in tin foil hats…

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Thank you so much for reading this post, I hope you enjoyed it and learned something new! If yes, please make sure to subscribe to the email list so that you get notified when new posts are added. Also feel free to check out my Ko-Fi page where you can donate a nice cup of radioactive coffee and support my work financially.

and remember, stay active!

When I first moved to Berlin, someone told me that there is a radioactive metro station somewhere in the city. Since then, I was on a mission to find it but unfortunately, with little to no success… until recently.

One of the most iconic places in Berlin must be the Brandenburger Tor and only one station away from it is the Potsdamer Platz which is home to the Sony Center as well as The Mall of Berlin, but today, we are going to focus what lies underneath the ground.

A few days ago I was coming back home from work and I had to change trains at the Potsdamer Platz S-Bahn station and as I was waiting for my train, a characteristic orange colour of the tiles caught my eye. From my bag I quickly took out my trusty Terra-P Geiger counter and I brought it near the tiles and within seconds the alarm started screaming.

Interestingly, after measuring a bunch of the orange tiles, I noticed that not all of the them where radioactive. This is most probably because some of those tiles have been replaced with newer ones which do not contain radioactive elements.

A quick gamma spectroscopy of the tiles made with my RAYSID gamma spectrometer, confirmed the presence of uranium. The peak at 186 keV indicates that these tiles contain Uranium-235 which means they were produced using natural uranium and not depleted.

Although these tiles make my Geiger counter scream, they are in fact harmless. That is because they emit mainly alpha and beta radiation and standing just a half meter away from them will result in radiation dropping to normal background levels.

So next time you are going to be visiting Berlin, make sure to bring a Geiger counter with you and check out the Potsdamer Platz S-Bahn station!

Exactly 10 years ago, a 9.2 magnitude earthquake hit Japan marking the beginning of one of the biggest nuclear disaster in history.

The earthquake caused the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant to switch to backup generators to run its cooling system. After about 50 minutes from the initial earthquake, a massive, 14-meter tall tsunami hit Japan’s coast damaging backup diesel generators at the FDNP. In the following days, hydrogen build-up in units 1, 3 and 4 caused them to exploded spreading radioactive fallout around the surrounding area and Pacific ocean.

Today, 10 years after the accident, the exclusion zone around Fukushima remains one of the most radioactive places on our planet and just like in Chernobyl, no-one knows how to deal with it…