Natural radionuclides and radiological hazards in sediment samples of the Euphrates River in Al Diwaniyah governorate, Iraq

Background: the radionuclide concentrations of 226ra, 232th and 40k were measured in the sediments samples of the euphrates river in al-diwaniyah city, iraq. materials and methods: effective technique of high purity germanium (hpge) detector based on a high-resolution gamma spectrometry system was used to determine the specific activity of natural and artificial radionuclide in sediments samples. results: the present investigated showed that the average values of specific activities of (226ra, 232th, and 40k) were 86.015, 48.446, and 764.661 bq/kg, respectively. the averages values of the radiological hazards radium equivalent (raeq), absorbed dose rate (dr) and external hazard index (hex) were 211.3 bq/kg, 100.9 ngy/h, and 0.56 respectively. specific activity of 137cs appeared in some sediment samples, which indicates the presence of industrial pollution in those areas. conclusion: according to these values, the results of the current study exceeded the global permissible values of the natural radionuclides.