Determination of the natural and artificial radioactivity of a selection of traditional Mexican medicinal herbs by gamma spectrometry

摘要

This work presents the results of a gamma spectrometry analysis of 30 traditional Mexican medicinal herbs. The analysis was carried out using low level background shielding, a hyper-pure germanium detector, and a multichannel analyzer system. Natural and artificial radiactivity concentration from Ra-226 (through Pb-214 and Bi-214), Th-228 (through Tl-208), Ra-228 (through Ac-228), K-40, and Cs-137 were determined in this analysis. The results show low concentration levels of natural radioactivity and no artificial radionuclides, and different contents of natural K-40, in the studied medicinal herbs. These low concentration levels of natural radionuclides, cannot be consider a health risk for common consumers.