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In order to examine effective applications of the newly developed internal standard method, determinations of Cr, Co, Ni, Zn, As, Rb, Sr, Y, Zr, Nb, Cs, Ce and Pb in three environmental materials, such as pond, lake and estuarine sediments, have been tried by means of photon activation. In these examinations, some major constituent elements in the above sediments were properly used as excellent and effective internal standards. In consequence, it was confirmed that highly accurate and precise determinations of the above 13 elements were achieved easily and favourably.

In order to apply the stable-isotope dilution method to charged-particle activation analysis, determination of strontium in biological materials has been studied by proton activation using isotopically enriched86Sr as a spike. To avoid thermal decomposition of biological materials due to the low penetrating power of proton beam, and to eliminate interfering nuclear reactions due to the matrix elements, strontium in the sample and/or isotopic mixture as a comparator was separated chemically together with most of calcium before bombardment, and the fraction isolated was converted to a silica-gel pellet as a most suitable physical and chemical form for bombardment. By processing as above, it was demonstrated that the strontium contents in the biological materials can be determined accurately, precisely and easily. Through a series of experiments, the method was also proved to be applicable for charged-particle activation analysis.

In order to study further the applicability of the newly developed stable isotope dilution method, simultaneous determination of Ca, Rb, Sr and Ce in three kinds of environmental materials has been tried by means of photon activation using isotopically enriched48Ca,87Rb,86Sr and142Ce as spikes. All determinations were demonstrated to be sensitive, highly specific and reasonably accurate.

In order to study the application of the new developed internal standard method to charged-particle activation analysis, simultaneous determination of Ti, Cr, Fe, Cu, Ga and Zr in several commercial aluminium alloys has been tried using the respective proton-induced reactions. As a result, it could be proved that the best precision and accuracy are also obtained in these determinations.

In order to study effective applications of the photon activation analysis using the internal standard method, determinations of Cr, Co, Ni, Zn, As, Rb, Sr, Y, Zr, Nb, Sb, Cs, Ba, Ce and Pb in two marine sediments as environmental materials have been examined by the use of a personal computer-based gamma-ray spectrometer equipped with a micro-robot for sample changing. In these determinations, some major and minor constituent elements in the samples were properly used as effective internal standards to check the roles with each other. As a result, it was demonstrated that accurate and precise determinations of the above 15 elements were achieved efficiently and favourably.