Practical Exercise For Szilard-Chalmers Reaction

You will get n-activated ethyliodide from your supervisor. The 128I half-life is only 25 min, so make sure you are well prepared and that you know exatly what you should do. Practice the complete procedure with "cold" reagents before starting to work with the radioactive material!

1. Use an automatic pipette to transfer 1 mL of the n-irradiated ethyliodide to a counting vial.
2. Transfer 2 mL ethyliodide to a test tube containing 2 mL NaHSO₃ solution. The test tube must have a cap and be able to withstand centrifugation.
3. Shake the test tube violently for 60 s.
4. Transfer 1 mL of each phase to counting vials.
5. Count the three counting vials on a NaI well-crystal. Count long enough to ensure that the counting uncertainty is less than 5%.
6. Calculate the count rate (in cps or cpm) and correct for background.
7. Correct for decay and calculate: A) the retention (amount in the organic phase) and B) the yield of the carrier free radioactivity in the inorganic phase.

Repeat the experiment, but this time add a little inorganic iodine to the NaHSO₃ solution before the extraction. Does it change the yield? Of course, now the inorganic phase will not be carrier free anymore.