Radium isotopes in the Polish Outer Carpathian mineral waters of various chemical composition.

The paper presents the activity concentrations of radium isotopes ((226)Ra, (228)Ra) and chemical compositions of above 70 mineral water samples collected from several dozens of springs and boreholes localized in the Polish Outer Carpathians. The activity concentrations of both radium isotopes clearly increase with the increase of water TDS, but decrease when the SO(4)(2-) content increases. These concentrations vary in the broad interval from a few to near 1000 mBq/L. The coefficient of the linear correlation between concentrations of these isotopes amounts to 0.85, and the activity ratio (226)Ra/(228)Ra is >1 for chloride-sodium waters, being ≈1 for hydrogen-carbonate and <1 for the sulfate ones.