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Abstract

A new method was designed and used for determining the half-life of the isotope 10Be. The method is based on (1) accurate 10Be/9Be measurements of 9Be-spiked solutions of a 10Be-rich master solution using multicollector ICP mass spectrometry (MC-ICP-MS) and (2) liquid scintillation counting (LSC) using the CIEMAT/NIST method for determining the activity concentrations of the solutions whose 10Be concentrations were determined by mass spectrometry. Important requirements for the success of this approach (a) was the previous coating of glass ampoules filled for counting experiments with 9Be, thereby reducing the risk of the adsorptive loss of 10Be; (b) the removal of Boron from solutions to be measured by MC-ICP-MS by cation chromatography without the introduction of mass fractionation and (c) the accurate determination of the mass bias of 10Be/9Be measurements by ICP-MS which are always affected by the space-charge effect. The mass bias factor was determined to be 1.1862 ± 0.071 for 10Be/9Be from careful fitting and error propagation of ratios of measured Li, B, Si, Cr, Fe, Cu, Sr, Nd, Hf, Tl and U standard solutions of known composition under the same measurement conditions. Employing this factor, an absolute 10Be/9Be ratio of 1.464 ± 0.014 was determined for a first dilution of the 10Be-rich master solution. This solution is now available as an absolute Be ratio standard in AMS measurements. Finally, a half-life of (1.386 ± 0.016) My (standard uncertainty) was calculated. This value is much more precise than previous estimates and was derived from a fully independent set of experiments. In a parallel, fully independent study using the same master solution, Korschinek et al. [35] have determined a half-life of (1.388 ± 0.018) My. The combined half-life and uncertainty amounts to (1.387 ± 0.012) My. We suggest the use of this value in nuclear studies and in studies that make use of cosmogenic 10Be in environmental and geologic samples.