Virtual radionuclide laboratory: An e-learning solution for a tailored training event

The Education and Training of regulators in Radiochemistry and Radiation Protection (RP) is one of the main issues to ensure successful RP. However, Education and Training of regulators is challenging since, in general, they do not necessarily have experience of working in a radionuclide laboratory and may have only limited access to such a laboratory. Hence, in a European HORIZON 2020 project particular attention was paid to officers of local authorities by developing a tailored training event using a modern E-Learning approach. This approach is based on a virtual radionuclide laboratory developed as a desktop application and gives the regulators the possibility of “entering” a radionuclide laboratory at any time and as often as want. Three different scenarios in the laboratory were combined with the task of deciding, from the authority's point of view, whether the laboratory should be granted a license to handle radioactive substances. A prototype of the course was conducted in August 2019, results were evaluated and the feedback given was extremely positive. The concept can easily be transferred to other countries and languages. The following article explores the virtual laboratory and its application in more detail.