Low-temperature heat capacity measurements on encapsulated transuranium samples

To enable safe specific-heat experiments on transuranium materials, we have tested the reliability of such measurements on encapsulated samples. We describe several encapsulation techniques and present the heat capacity of Stycast (R) 2850 FT used for one encapsulation technique. A number of test measurements (on PuGa3, PuSb, PuCoGa5, NpCoGa5, NpTe) are in good agreement with previous data or results of other experimental techniques and show that the experimental errors remain acceptable in most cases, depending of course also on the intrinsic specific heat of the studied material. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.