Neutron Activation Analysis in the IAEA Projects on Air Pollution

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been promoting studies on air pollution since 1992. During the period 1992–1999 there have been six major co-ordinated research and regional technical co-operation projects in which 77 counterparts from 40 Member States actively participated. The studies supported by the IAEA have included ambient and workplace airborne particulate matter, the use of appropriate plant biomonitors and a series of laboratory intercomparison exercises in support to these projects. Recent and current IAEA projects in this field are reviewed in the light of the application of neutron activation analysis, which has been used as a major analytical technique by more than two thirds of the counterparts, and contributed also approximately two thirds of all analytical results for the intercomparison exercises.