Al-O-F materials as novel adsorbents for gaseous radioiodine capture

Re-processing used nuclear fuel requires a method to effectively capture and dispose of gaseous radioiodine. Previous work has shown that nanoporous Al-O materials are effective at capturing gaseous iodine; molecular dynamics simulations have shown that the addition of fluoride to the Al-O surface should increase the amount of iodine capture. Twelve different materials with different ratios of F:Al were created. These materials were chemically characterized and functionally characterized with respect to gaseous iodine uptake. The addition of fluoride does in fact lead to a substantial (10-100x) increase in iodine uptake per unit surface area. However, the amount of uptake does not appear to be directly related to the total fluoride content of the solid phase material. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.