Carbon-14 transfer into potato plants following a short exposure to an atmospheric 14CO2 emission: observations and model predictions

Abstract

To improve the understanding of the environmental (14)C behaviour, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) coordinated a Tritium and C-14 Working Group (T&C WG) in its EMRAS (Environmental Modelling for Radiation Safety) programme. One of the scenarios developed in the frame of T&C WG involved the prediction of time dependent (14)C concentrations in potato plants. The experimental data used in the scenario were obtained from a study in which potatoes (Solanum tuberosum cv. Romano) were exposed to atmospheric (14)CO(2) in a wind tunnel. The observations were used to test models that predict temporal changes in (14)C concentrations in leaves at each sampling time for each experiment and (14)C concentrations in tubers at the final harvest of each experiment. The experimental data on (14)C dynamics in leaves are poorly reproduced by most of the models, but the predicted concentrations in tubers are in good agreement with the observations.