VIII.Terrestrial Radionuclides in the Environment International Conference on Environmental Protection was held in Vonyarcvashegy, Hungary on October 4-7, 2022. Our university was invited to participate in the conference. Prof. Naofumi Akata and 4 graduate students (M2: Haruka Kuwata, M2: Khemruthai Kheamsiri, M1: Mizuki Kiso, M1: Aoi Sampei) participated in the on-site conference.

On the second day of the conference, Ms. Kheamsiri gave an oral presentation on Tritium concentration in natural water samples collected at Fukushima Prefecture after the FDNPP accident, and Ms. Kuwata gave an oral presentation on Evaluation of the semi-automatically combustion system for organically bound tritium analysis using reference material of pine needles. In the afternoon, there was a poster session, and M1: Yuki Oda, presented his exhibit entitled “Evaluation of Outdoor Radon in Aomori Prefecture for Radiation Risk Awareness. On the third day, in the session chaired by Prof. Akata, Ms. Sampei gave an oral presentation on “A Japanese respiratory airway model to refine inhalation exposure dose assessment”, and Ms. Kiso gave an oral presentation on “Activity-weighted Particle Size distributions of radon and thoron progeny aerosols in the atmosphere”.

This was the first time of our graduate students attended an international conference aboard. However, they were able to engage in lively discussions without being intimidated by the English language. Thanks to the international seminars class, which has been held twice a month at the institute.

In between sessions, we explained our developing instrument namely “Portable environmental radiation/radioactivity monitor (PERRM)” which cooperated with the Advanced Fusion Technology Corporation and many people were interested in it.

On October 8, we visited Pannónia University in Veszprém. We were able to see the radiation-controlled areas and laboratories, which are different from those in Japan, and to view valuable materials.