Trends, events and potential sources of Xe-detections in the German radioxenon network.

The measurement of radioxenons (133Xe, 131mXe, 133mXe, 135Xe) in the atmosphere is a keystone for the verification of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). At the German Federal Office for Radiation Protection (Bundesamt für Strahlenschutz, BfS) activity concentrations of radioactive noble gases at several sites in Germany have been measured for more than 5 decades, initially to monitor nuclear facilities and since the mid-1990s also to support the development of measurement and monitoring systems and procedures for verification of the CTBT. Average 133Xe activity concentration in air measured daily at station RN33 of the International Monitoring System (IMS) of the CTBTO on Mt Schauinsland has decreased since 2008. Due to the decreasing radioxenon background in the atmosphere, laboratory measurements with less sensitive proportional counters developed in-house are increasingly replaced by an isotope specific ß-γ laboratory system for radioxenon analyses. Six years of radioxenon activity concentrations measured with the ß-γ laboratory system in weekly samples from monitoring sites in Germany are presented. Activity concentrations of 133Xe in southern Germany are now typically below 1 mBq m-3 and have decreased by an order of magnitude in the past 25 years. Magnitude and variability of 133Xe activity concentrations are generally larger in northern and western Germany compared to the south, most likely due to the prevailing wind directions in the region. Selected, but typical, periods of elevated radioxenon levels at the stations are investigated and the value of stack emission data is demonstrated.

Socioathy and drug use in a young psychiatric population.

Recent studies have consistently demonstrated a higher-than-expected proportion of heavy drug users among young psychiatric patients. Careful reading of these reports fails to adduce what might account for this constant finding. In order to examine this question more closely, one hundred young psychiatric inpatients (aged 15 to 25 years) were studied in detail. The following extensive data were obtained for each patient: demography (sex, age, race, marital status occupation), clinical characteristics (prior psychiatric care, presenting complaint, duration of hospitalization, diagnosis, treatment, disposition), prior social problems (truancy, runaway, pregnancy out of wedlock, divorce or separation, vehicular accident while intoxicated, felony), and social resources on admission (employment, friends, family-of-origin). An extensive drug history consisted of types of drugs, duration and frequency of usage, and pattern of use over the previous twelve months. Based on specific criteria patients were divided into abstainers, occasional users, regular users, and heavy users. Forty-nine of the patients were tabulated as heavy users. Compared to the other patients, heavy users were found to have more unemployment, more divorce and separation, more characterological and fewer neurotic diagnoses, more problematic prior social events, and fewer social resources at the time of admission. Unexpectedly, the two groups did not differ significantly for all other demographic and clinical parameters. The implications of these findings for our psychopathologic categorization and for our management of young in-patients are noted.