Investigation of radon and its progeny in ceramic cooking dishes

Background: Recently, the concentration of radioactivity in the ceramic cooking dishes is found to exceed the reference level values. Therefore, there is a need to measure the radon concentration in ceramic cooking dishes, especially radon gas inhalation which is considered to be the second largest cause of lung cancer. Materials and Methods: In this work, a collection of 19 different kinds of ceramic cooking dishes is measured using CR-39 SSNTD (Solid State Nuclear Track Detector). Results: The obtained results showed that the highest value of radon concentration is found to be 23.07 ± 1.44 Bq/m3, 148.41± 5.99 Bq/m3 and 783.03± 35.96 Bq/m3for high quality, low quality and handmade ceramic cooking dishes, respectively. Indicating that the radon concentration for 18.19% of handmade ceramic cooking dishes is exceeded the internationally accepted levels 600 Bq/m3. Conclusions: All values of radon concentration for handmade ceramic cooking dishes are found to be higher than the measured values for high quality and low-quality manufactured ceramic cooking dishes. In addition, the mean values of annual effective doses of handmade ceramic cooking dishes are found to be varied from 2.20 to 22.47mSv/y, exceeding the internationally accepted action level from ICRP 2007 agency (1). Hence, this study recommends that care must be taken when using the handmade ceramic cooking dishes.