Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-nr4z6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-22T07:06:22.859Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Accelerator-Measured 14C Activity in Tree Rings From the Vicinity of the First Atomic Bomb Test

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2016

S W Leavitt  and
Austin Long
S W Leavitt
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Wisconsin-Parkside Kenosha, Wisconsin 53141-2000
Austin Long
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Wisconsin-Parkside Kenosha, Wisconsin 53141-2000
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Detonation of the first fission bomb at White Sands, New Mexico, on July 16, 1945, produced a tremendous neutron flux capable of creating tritium and radiocarbon byproducts. We sampled a 115-year-old pinyon (Pinus edulis) 10km east of the Trinity test site to determine 14C evidence of this event. The most likely mechanism for this enrichment in the 1945 tree ring would be fixation of 14CO2 produced at the blast site and carried with the fallout cloud over the pinyon site. Analysis of cellulose of the 1944 and 1945 rings shows δ13C values of −19.9 and −19.5, respectively, and 14C activity (fraction of modern uncorrected for δ13C) as 0.991 ± .005 and 0.991 ± .006, respectively. It is likely that the duration and/or concentration of the 14CO2 exposure was not sufficient to increase 14C activity expected for that year.

Type
III. Global 14C Variations
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 31 , Issue 3: June 20-25, 1988 Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia , 1989 , pp. 762 - 765
Copyright
Copyright © The American Journal of Science 

References

Fan, CY, Chen, TM, Yun, SX and Dai, KM, 1986, Radiocarbon activity variation in dated tree rings grown in MacKenzie Delta, in Stuiver, M and Kra, RS, eds, Internatl 14C conf, 12th, Proc: Radiocarbon, v 28, no. 2A, p 300–305.Google Scholar
Glasstone, S, ed, 1964, The effects of nuclear weapons: Washington, DC, US Atomic Energy Comm.Google Scholar
Green, JW, 1963, Wood cellulose, in Whistler, RL, ed, Methods of carbohydrate chemistry: New York, Academic Press, p 9–21.Google Scholar
Haberstock, G, Heinzl, J, Korschinek, G, Morinaga, H, Nolte, E, Ratzinger, U, Kato, K and Wolf, M, 1986, Accelerator mass spectrometry with fully stripped 36Cl ions, in Stuiver, M and Kra, RS, eds, Internatl 14C conf, 12th, Proc: Radiocarbon, v 28, no. 2A, p 204–210.Google Scholar
Jull, AJT, Donahue, DJ, Hatheway, AL, Linick, TW and Toolin, LJ, 1986, Production of graphite targets by deposition from CO/H2 for precision accelerator 14C measurements, in Stuiver, M and Kra, RS, eds, Internatl 14C conf, 12th, Proc: Radiocarbon, v 28, no. 2A, p 191–197.Google Scholar
Lamont, L, 1965, Dawn over zero, the story of the atomic bomb: New York, Atheneum.Google Scholar