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We have recently suggested the possibility of using the isotope Ca-41 (half-life 130. 000 years) for radioactive dating. The potential significance of such a technique to archaeometry is obvious, since it would permit the direct dating of bone samples beyond the radiocarbon time scale. We discuss here two important steps that have been made toward testing this possibility. An experiment has been successfully carried out at the ALICE accelerator in Orsay which directly counted 310 MeV Ca-41 ions, at a concentration level of Ca-41/Ca ^ 10-11. In order to test the possibility of enriching natural Ca-41 to the level measurable with ALICE, experiments have been carried out at the isotope separator SIDONIE. Using CaO prepared from natural bone amples, Ca-41 was enriched a factor of > 1000, with an overall effeciency of ^ 5 %.
Raisbeck et al. (Tue,) studied this question.