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Emergency preparedness

Co-operations of the BfS with national and international partners in the field of emergency preparedness

Biological dosimetry networksShow / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

To provide international cooperation and mutual assistance in biological dosimetry in case of radiological/nuclear emergency.

Automation of the dicentric assayShow / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

The aim of this co-operation is to standardize and harmonize the automation of the dicentric chromosome assay to be prepared in case of a major radiation accident to provide this assay for biological dosimetry in several laboratories simultaneously.

Automation of the micronucleus assayShow / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

The aim of this co-operation is to standardize the automation of the micronucleus assay to be prepared in case of a major radiation accident to provide this assay for biological dosimetry in several laboratories simultaneously.

Co-operation concerning the FISH assayShow / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

The aim of this co-operation is to harmonize and standardize the fluorescence in situ hybridization assay (FISH) to be prepared in case of a major radiation accident to provide this assay for biological dosimetry in several laboratories simultaneously.

Gamma H2AX assayShow / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

The aim of this co-operation is to harmonize and standardize gamma H2AX assay to be prepared in case of a major radiation accident to provide this assay for biological dosimetry in several laboratories simultaneously.

An (inter)national noble gas sampling network for monitoring atmospheric activity concentration of Krypton-85 and radioxenonShow / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

Krypton-85 and radioactive xenon isotopes are highly volatile and thus routinely released from facilities for nuclear fuel reprocessing or medical isotope production, nuclear reactors and other civil applications. The atmospheric background concentrations are characteristic, both temporally and geographically. A sound knowledge of this background, trends and underlying transport mechanisms as well as highly sensitive measurement technologies are needed if traces of these substances are used to uncover clandestine nuclear activities.

They are especially useful for verification applications for

  • the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban-Treaty (CTBT),
  • the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and possibly
  • a future Treaty to prohibit production of fissile material (Fissile Material Cut-off, FMCT).

For more than three decades BfS is running a system of sampling stations with partners world wide. Samples are analysed in its noble gas laboratory. A national monitoring network of automated systems for the measurement of Radioxenon in the atmosphere with a high temporal resolution is currently being set up. The data are used for the reconstruction of the sources of these noble gases, as a basis for feasibility studies for verification methodologies as well as for documenting trends and informing the public.

Utilization of radionuclide measurements in ambient air for investigating transport processes in the environment and for validating of atmospheric dispersion modellingShow / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

Radionuclides have an important role as tracers in environmental sciences. The continuous measurement of radioactive noble gases as well of radionuclides attached to particles at distributed sites provides important information on source distribution, transport in the environment and transfer between different compartments, namely atmosphere, hydrosphere and biosphere. The BfS is particularly offering its quality assured many year data series to cooperation partners for use in publications.

International Noble Gas Experiment (INGE)Show / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

Radioactive xenon isotopes play a key role for the verification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). An operational global monitoring network must be able to detect and locate clandestine nuclear weapons tests and to discriminate weapons test xenon from civil background.

Coordinated efforts are needed to develop both, highly sensitive but also robust measurement systems and procedures for data analysis and source reconstruction, to be able to unambiguously identify verification relevant events. The INGE collaboration mainly supports the Provisional Technical Secretariat of the CTBTO and national institutions and data centres of States Signatories in charge of data interpretation.

Harmonization of ambient dose rate measurements within the EU (Project AIRDOS)Show / Hide

Co-operation partners

Objective

Gamma dose rate is being monitored in large scale monitoring networks all over Europe since over 20 years. Bilateral and international data exchanged steadily increases. Different systems based on different physical principles and operated in different environments render data which are not directly comparable. This is mainly due to different sensitivities of detectors against the various components of the ambient dose rate.

A standardised procedure is needed which corrects for all relevant effects based on validated inter-comparisons. This should then facilitate a harmonized presentation of the data. The inter-calibration platform (INTERCAL) at the Schauinsland mountain site provides with its long term data inter-comparison an important contribution complementing the biannual inter-comparison measurement organized by EURADOS.

In addition the BfS is involved in the research project SRT-v15 "Metrology for Radiological Early Warning Networks in Europe" of the European Association of Metrology Institutes (EURAMET). The main tasks are: development and characterization of novel spectroscopic GDR probes, QA/QC of GDR measurements, further development of air particular filter systems with better QA/QC and harmonization, validation of the influence of systematic heterogeneities of the measured data within the longtime experience of the EURDEP/AIRDOS projects.

State of 2025.01.09

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