Annals of the ICRP最新文献

The International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) developed effective dose as a quantity related to risk for occupational and public exposure. There was a need for a similar dose quantity linked to risk for making everyday decisions relating to medical procedures. Coefficients were developed to enable the calculation of doses to organs and tissues, and effective doses for procedures in nuclear medicine and radiology during the 1980s and 1990s. Effective dose has provided a valuable tool that is now used in the establishment of guidelines for patient referral and justification of procedures, choice of appropriate imaging techniques, and providing dose data on potential exposure of volunteers for research studies, all of which require the benefits from the procedure to be weighed against the risks. However, the approximations made in the derivation of effective dose are often forgotten, and the uncertainties in calculations of risks are discussed. An ICRP report on protection dose quantities has been prepared that provides more information on the application of effective dose, and concludes that effective dose can be used as an approximate measure of possible risk. A discussion of the way in which it should be used is given here, with applications for which it is considered suitable. Approaches to the evaluation of risk and methods for conveying information on risk are also discussed.

[Formula: see text]There is a growing desire amongst space-faring nations to venture beyond the Van Allen radiation belts to a variety of intriguing locations in our inner solar system. Mars is the ultimate destination. In two decades, we hope to vicariously share in the adventure of an intrepid crew of international astronauts on the first voyage to the red planet.This will be a daunting mission with an operational profile unlike anything astronauts have flown before. A flight to Mars will be a 50-million-kilometre journey. Interplanetary distances are so great that voice and data communications between mission control on Earth and a base on Mars will feature latencies up to 20 min. Consequently, the ground support team will not have real-time control of the systems aboard the transit spacecraft nor the surface habitat. As cargo resupply from Earth will be impossible, the onboard inventory of equipment and supplies must be planned strategically in advance. Furthermore, the size, amount, and function of onboard equipment will be constrained by limited volume, mass, and power allowances.With less oversight from the ground, all vehicle systems will need to be reliable and robust. They must function autonomously. Astronauts will rely on their own abilities and onboard resources to deal with urgent situations that will inevitably arise.The deep space environment is hazardous. Zero- and reduced-gravity effects will trigger deconditioning of the cardiovascular, musculoskeletal, and other physiological systems. While living for 2.5 years in extreme isolation, Mars crews will experience psychological stressors such as loss of privacy, reduced comforts of living, and distant relationships with family members and friends.Beyond Earth's protective magnetosphere, the fluence of ionising radiation will be higher. Longer exposure of astronauts to galactic cosmic radiation could result in the formation of cataracts, impaired wound healing, and degenerative tissue diseases. Genetic mutations and the onset of cancer later in life are also possible. Acute radiation sickness and even death could ensue from a large and unpredictable solar particle event.There are many technological barriers that prevent us from carrying out a mission to Mars today. Before launching the first crew, we will need to develop processes for in-situ resource utilisation. Rather than bringing along large quantities of oxygen, water, and propellant from Earth, future astronauts will need to produce some of these consumables from local space-based resources.Ion propulsion systems will be needed to reduce travel times to interplanetary destinations, and we will need systems to land larger payloads (up to 40 tonnes of equipment and supplies for a human mission) on planetary surfaces. These and other innovations will be needed before humans venture into deep space.However, it is the delivery of health care that is regarded as one of the most important obstacles to be overcome. Physicians,

The field of artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming almost every aspect of modern society, including medical imaging. In computed tomography (CT), AI holds the promise of enabling further reductions in patient radiation dose through automation and optimisation of data acquisition processes, including patient positioning and acquisition parameter settings. Subsequent to data collection, optimisation of image reconstruction parameters, advanced reconstruction algorithms, and image denoising methods improve several aspects of image quality, especially in reducing image noise and enabling the use of lower radiation doses for data acquisition. Finally, AI-based methods to automatically segment organs or detect and characterise pathology have been translated out of the research environment and into clinical practice to bring automation, increased sensitivity, and new clinical applications to patient care, ultimately increasing the benefit to the patient from medically justified CT examinations. In summary, since the introduction of CT, a large number of technical advances have enabled increased clinical benefit and decreased patient risk, not only by reducing radiation dose, but also by reducing the likelihood of errors in the performance and interpretation of medically justified CT examinations.

The International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) recently issued ICRP Publication 142 on radiological protection from naturally occurring radioactive material (NORM) in industrial processes. Industries involving NORM may give rise to multiple hazards, and the radiological hazard is not necessarily dominant. They are diverse and may involve exposure of people and the environment where protective actions need to be considered. In some cases, there is a potential for significant routine exposure of workers and members of the public. Releases of large volumes of NORM may also result in detrimental effects on the environment from radiological and non-radiological constituents. However, industries involving NORM present no real prospect of a radiological emergency leading to tissue reactions or immediate danger for life. Radiological protection in these industries can be appropriately addressed on the basis of the principles of justification of the actions taken and optimisation of protection using reference levels. An integrated and graded approach is recommended for the protection of workers, the public, and the environment, where consideration of non-radiological hazards is integrated with the radiological hazards, and the approach to protection is optimised (graded) so that the use of various radiological protection programme elements is consistent with the hazards while not imposing unnecessary burdens.

The radiation environment in space is a complex mixture of particles of solar and galactic origin with a broad range of energies. In astronaut dose estimation, three sources must be considered: galactic cosmic radiation, trapped particles, and solar energetic particles (SEPs). The astronaut dose due to SEP exposure during a space mission is more difficult to estimate than the other components because the occurrence of a large solar particle event cannot be predicted by the current space weather research. Thus, several models have been proposed to estimate the worst-case scenario and/or the probability of the integral SEP fluence during a particular space mission, considering the confidence level, solar activity, and duration of the mission. In addition, recent investigations of the cosmogenic nuclide concentrations in tree rings and ice cores have revealed that the sun can cause solar particle events much larger than the largest event recorded in the modern solar observations. If such an extreme event occurs during a mission to deep space, astronauts may suffer from radiation doses in excess of the threshold value for some tissue reactions (0.5 Gy) and their career limit (0.6-1.2 Sv). This article reviews the recent progress made in space weather research that is useful for cosmic radiation dosimetry.

As we work towards a holistic approach to radiation protection, we begin to consider and integrate protection beyond humans to include, among other things, non-human biota. Non-human biota not only includes environmental flora and fauna, but also livestock, companion animals, working animals, etc. Although under consideration, there is currently little guidance in terms of protection strategies for types of non-human biota beyond wildlife. For example, in recent years, veterinary procedures that make use of ionising radiation have increased in number and have diversified considerably, which has made radiation protection in veterinary applications of ionising radiation more challenging, both for humans and the animal patients. In fact, the common belief that doses to professionals and members of the public from these applications will be very low to negligible, and doses to the animals will not be acutely harmful nor even affect their lifetime probability of developing cancer, needs to be revisited in the light of higher dose diagnostic and interventional techniques, and certainly in the case of therapeutic applications. This paper provides a brief overview of the initiatives of the International Commission on Radiological Protection concerning radiation protection aspects of veterinary practice, and poses a variety of perspectives for consideration and further discussion.

Medical exposures form the largest manmade contributor to total ionising radiation exposure of the UK population. In recent years, new technologies have been developed to improve treatment and prognosis of individuals treated with radiation for diseases such as cancer. However, there is evidence of public, patient, and medical professional concern that radiation protection regulations and practices, as well as understanding of potential long-term adverse health effects of radiation exposure (in the context of other health risks), have not always 'kept pace' with technological developments in this field. This is a truly complex, multi-disciplinary problem for the modern world.The 'Radiation Theme' of the Public Health England and Newcastle University Health Protection Research Unit on 'Chemical and Radiation Threats and Hazards' is addressing this need, with a key focus on a genuinely interdisciplinary approach bringing together world-leading epidemiologists, radiation biologists, clinicians, statisticians, and artists. In addition, the project has a strong grounding in public, patient, and medical professional involvement in research. Similarly, the EU-CONCERT-funded LDLensRad project seeks to understand the mechanisms of action of low-dose ionising radiation in the lens of the eye, and the potential contribution to the development of cataract - in contemporary research, such projects will only be considered successful when they make use of expertise from a variety of fields and when they are able to demonstrate that the outputs are not only of benefit to society, but that society understands and welcomes the benefits. Finally, successful engagement, training, and retention of early career scientists within this field is crucial for sustainability of the research. Herein, the contribution of embedded interdisciplinary working, stakeholder involvement, and training of early career scientists to recent advancements in the field of medical (and wider) radiation protection research is discussed and considered.