STUDY OF THE SIZES AND DISTRIBUTIONS OF COLLOIDAL WATER IN WATER-EMULSIFIER-TOLUENE SYSTEMS

Abstract

This chapter presents the study of the sizes and distributions of colloidal water in water-emulsifier-toluene systems. The number of applications of liquid scintillation counting to the measure of radionuclides in aqueous samples has increased at a very rapid rate over the past few years. In the majority of these applications, the aqueous samples are dispersed into liquid scintillation solutions by the use of emulsifiers. The aqueous phase is dispersed as tiny micelles of much less than a few microns in size. The sizes, numbers, and distributions of these micelles could affect the real and apparent efficiency of the liquid scintillation processes. For very low energy radiations, the ability to even detect the radiations may be greatly dependent upon these properties of the colloidal systems. In this work, several radionuclides with different modes of decay have been employed in an effort to gain insight into the nature of these emulsion systems. Two different emulsion systems were studied because each showed certain characteristics which were important in the understanding of their applications to the problems of liquid scintillation counting.