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Fukushima's Nuclear Signature Found In California Wine (technologyreview.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from MIT Technology Review: Is it possible to see the effects of the Fukushima nuclear disaster in California wines produced at the time? Today we get an answer, thanks to a study carried out by french pharmacologist Philippe Hubert and a couple of colleagues. "In January 2017, we came across a series of Californian wines (Cabernet Sauvignon) from vintage 2009 to 2012," say Hubert and company. This set of wines provides the perfect test. The Fukushima disaster occurred on March 11, 2011. Any wine made before that date should be free of the effects, while any dating from afterward could show them. The team began their study with the conventional measurement of cesium-137 levels in the unopened bottles. That showed levels to be indistinguishable from background noise.
But the team was able to carry out more-sensitive tests by opening the wine and reducing it to ash by evaporation. This involves heating the wine to 100 degrees Celsius for one hour and then increasing the temperature to 500 degrees Celsius for eight hours. In this way, a standard 750-milliliter bottle of wine produces around four grams of ashes. The ashes were then placed in a gamma ray detector to look for signs of cesium-137. Using this method, Hubert and his colleagues found measurable amounts of cesium-137 above background levels in the wine produced after 2011. "It seems there is an increase in activity in 2011 by a factor of two," conclude the team.
But the team was able to carry out more-sensitive tests by opening the wine and reducing it to ash by evaporation. This involves heating the wine to 100 degrees Celsius for one hour and then increasing the temperature to 500 degrees Celsius for eight hours. In this way, a standard 750-milliliter bottle of wine produces around four grams of ashes. The ashes were then placed in a gamma ray detector to look for signs of cesium-137. Using this method, Hubert and his colleagues found measurable amounts of cesium-137 above background levels in the wine produced after 2011. "It seems there is an increase in activity in 2011 by a factor of two," conclude the team.
label might be washed out...
nothing to see here - move along
You have proven we can detect previously unmeasurably small amounts of radiation. Seriouslly? You had to boil down an entire bottle of wine to 4 grams of solids, then put that into the core of a gamma ray detector, just so you can determine that instead of one atom of Cesium-137, there were two.
Talk about over-hyped headlines. The only important sentence is, "[They] showed levels to be indistinguishable from background noise."
Life, the Universe, and Everything... in my image.
NukaSauvignon, maybe?
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"It seems there is an increase in activity in 2011 by a factor of two," conclude the team.
No...
The team began their study with the conventional measurement of cesium-137 levels in the unopened bottles. That showed levels to be indistinguishable from background noise.
What I conclude is that this testing method, removing the 99.5% water mass, simply makes it possible to detect otherwise undetectable amounts of cesium-137.
Sounds more like a French "researcher" wants to scare people off California wine so they will buy more French wine. OMG! DOUBLE the radiation as before! And if that "double dose" of radioactivity is still 4 orders of magnitude less than, say, standing out in direct sunlight, then it's a bit dishonest to publish this "conclusion" and pretend it's very significant.
500 degrees Celsius? I said raise it to room temperature!
The only real use of this research beyond curiosity is authenticating wine (but only if there's enough that destroying a liter of it is worthwhile). Fukushima created a barely detectable bump compared to the few years before the incident.
Looking at the graphs in the actual paper, The signature isn't really even visible compared to the spikes after the '50s nuclear tests.
Similar to how the "digital" icon gets reused a lot.
The levels of Cesium-137 are a radioisotopic measure, not a location measure.
"Fukushima's nuclear signature" is a mistake of the research. No citations. No proofs. No relations.
California has many wine's farms.
But California has many nuclear centrals.
The environment of Nevada or New Mexico was polluted by their nuclear detonations in the past. It could affect to the wine's farms of California.
Don't they know that they are supposed to drink the wine? Not reduce it to ash? There's more than one way to abuse alcohol. You can drink too much of it, or waste it by not drinking it at all.
I'm surprised that the California health bored hasn't demanded that there be a warning on the labels that Cesium-137 may be present in the wines and is known to cause cancer.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
It doubled. Big deal. Sadly, all the nut jobs will be screaming about it and claiming that nuke power is bad, while pushing coal. Of course coal has put far more radiation into the air and water than has nuke power.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
So that's the fizzy taste.
I like food that fights back.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
No fooling? Its a small world afterall.
The half-life of Cs-137 is about 30 years. If the amount found in California-produced wines was twice the previous level in 2011, (assuming all this is true, which I'm not really willing to assume,) then that means half of it will decay (statistically speaking,) in the 30 years following 2011. So if you hold-off drinking it until 2041, which is probably good for aging the wine anyway, that means the amount of radioactive, Fukushima-connected radionuclide (of Cs-137) should be at most, back to pre-tsunami levels by then.
Of course, if Cs-137 decays into something that's just like, WAY more poisonous, on the other hand... this might be cause for concern. Otherwise, the danger from the alcohol in the bottle is probably greater than the cesium inside. But who knows, I could be wrong. Just to be on the safe side, I'm going to drink something else instead... like the perfectly safe, totally clean drinking water in much of the rural, central United States. Bottoms UP!
Our reign has gone on long enough. Indeed. Summon the meteors.
France can go fully environmental.
French wine is enjoyed at perfect temperature.
With the correct use of online memes wine users will be returning to French and EU quality and food standards.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Well, I can still detect Chernobyl's nuclear signature in French truffles! So there. In other news, bananas are radioactive. You are radio active too! Fact. This is just meaningless scare mongering with a little error in sample. The paper was written by a nincompoop. Source: am a physicist and have worked with gamma ray spectroscopy.
It would have been a much more satisfying experiment.
The slashbots are at it again...at least the summary isn't "alarming", it's stating the facts. You are all jumping to conclusions mat.
"Tell your mom I'm just gonna get a little cacner, Stan"
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
My wine-cellar light is broken, I could use wine that glows in the dark.
Reminds me of some wine/cigar/whisky enthusiasts saying they like when there is a story and history behind whatever they are drinking/smoking.
Not sure this is the story they wanted though.
So using their own graph and comparing to when countries were actively conducting nuclear testing it's somewhere around 0.1% of the Cesium from back then. Anyone drinking a bottle of wine from 2011 shouldn't care. Anyone drinking a bottle of wine from the 50s or 60s however...where is the PSA? Where I ask you?? Where???
You can get rich if you own a politician, but you have to be rich to buy one in the first place.