Long - term atmospheric depositional fluxes of radionuclides at Málaga (Coastal Mediterranean Station)

Abstract

7Be and 210Pb are radionuclides which have been measured routinely in many places in order to study the description of environmental processes such as aerosol transit and residence times in the troposphere, aerosol deposition velocities and aerosol trapping by ground vegetation. 7Be is one of the radionuclide produced by spallation reactions of cosmic rays with light atmospheric nuclei and rapidly associates primarily with submicron-sized aerosol particles. 210Pb is a natural radionuclide of the 238U series which is widely used as a tracer and its depositional pattern and give information on continental aerosols in lower troposphere. Therefore, these two radionuclides with their different sources are useful to understand the mechanisms of aerosol removal from the atmosphere. 40K is also a natural radionuclide and has been associated with the arrival of coarse re-suspended material from the Africa continent. The bulk atmospheric deposition of 7Be , 210Pb and 40K has been measured at Málaga, south-eastern Spain from January 2005 to December 2014, on monthly basis.