Dr. Nancy Turner, a Texas A&M AgriLife Research scientist in College Station, was one of a team of researchers who recently studied different interventions to protect from radiation-induced bone loss.
Feb 19, 2016
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People who received frequent dental x-rays in the past have an increased risk of developing the most commonly diagnosed primary brain tumor in the United States. That is the finding of a study published early online in Cancer, ...
Apr 10, 2012
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Researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), through a combination of time-lapse live imaging and mathematical modeling of a special line of human breast cells, ...
Dec 20, 2011
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Ionizing radiation is not without danger to human populations. Indeed, exposure to nuclear radiation leads to an increase in male births relative to female births, according to a new study by Hagen Scherb and Kristina Voigt ...
May 26, 2011
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In experiments where human skin tissue samples were exposed to low doses of ionizing radiation, scientists at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory found that a skin tissue model showed perturbations that suggest its stability ...
Apr 6, 2015
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Scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have found clues to the functioning of an important damage response protein in cells. The protein, p53, can cause cells to stop dividing or even to commit suicide when ...
Jun 30, 2011
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Research introduced at SNM's 58th Annual Meeting could be a sign of hope for patients with neuroendocrine cancer not responding well to standard therapies. Most radiotherapies use medical isotopes that emit beta radiation. ...
Jun 6, 2011
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An article in the January issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology summarizes methods for radiation dose optimization in pediatric computed tomography (CT) scans. Approximately seven to eight million CT examinations ...
Jan 6, 2012
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Developmental dislocation (dysplasia) of the hip (DDH) is a common congenital condition in which a child's upper thighbone is dislocated from the hip socket. The condition can be present at birth or develop during a child's ...
Feb 9, 2012
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Governments and the nuclear industry have failed to address serious data gaps and untested assumptions guiding exposure limits to Cesium (Cs)-137 released in the Chernobyl accident in 1986 and this year's incident at Fukushima, ...
Nov 21, 2011
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Ionizing radiation consists of subatomic particles or electromagnetic waves that are energetic enough to detach electrons from atoms or molecules, ionizing them. The occurrence of ionization depends on the energy of the impinging individual particles or waves, and not on their number. An intense flood of particles or waves will not cause ionization if these particles or waves do not carry enough energy to be ionizing. Roughly speaking, particles or photons with energies above a few electron volts (eV) are ionizing.
Examples of ionizing particles are energetic alpha particles, beta particles, and neutrons. The ability of electromagnetic waves (photons) to ionize an atom or molecule depends on their wavelength. Radiation on the short wavelength end of the electromagnetic spectrum - ultraviolet, x-rays, and gamma rays - is ionizing.
Ionizing radiation comes from radioactive materials, x-ray tubes, particle accelerators, and is present in the environment. It is invisible and undetectable by human senses, so instruments such as geiger counters are required to detect its presence. It has many practical uses in medicine, research, construction, and other areas, but presents a health hazard if used improperly. Exposure to radiation causes microscopic damage to living tissue, resulting in skin burns, radiation sickness and death at high doses and cancer, tumors and genetic damage at low doses.
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