Exposure to External and Internal Radiation Radium Studies

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5UP PLE MENT NO. I 7 A..F. Stehney and those listed in specific groups 60. DIRECT MANPOWER (Man Years) SCI ENT I FIC TEMPORARY .PAID BY ANL ESTIMATED FOR FISCAL YEARS FY 1973 BUDGET REQUl REMENTS FY 1975 TEMPORARY PAID BY OTHERS TEMPORARY PAID BY ANL TOTAL MAN YEARS 38.5 45.5 - 48.4 TEMPORARY PAID BY OTHERS TOTAL OTHER TECHNICAL MATERIALS AND SERVICES 51 1 507 - 657 Health Division Services 50 50 - 55

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REPOSITORY: OFFICE OF HUMAN RADIATION COLLECTION: PLUTONIUM INJECTION INVESTIGATION FOLDER: EXTRA COPIES

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BIOMEDICAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH Exposure to External and Internal Radiation 2. BUDGET ACTIVITY NO. ANL 63100 through 6 3 3 0 0 (RER, BIM) All work with humans in the Radium Studies is done in conformity with DHEW policy on protection of human subjects. The protocol of procedures and practices was approved on September 17, 1971, by the Argonne Review Committee for Research Projects Involving Human Subjects, 'and a followup report for the period July 1, 1971 to December 31, 1972 w a s accepted by the Committee on

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See next page 1Explanation of Major Procurements MIT Satellite Laboratory. Operation of a satellite laboratory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is extremely valuable to the Center for Human Radiobiology. This laboratory, consisting of a total of eight people, makes whole-body counts and radon breath measurements of cases from the east coast, and arranges for their medical examinations. 100 cases per year. It also aids in the search for new radium cases and in arranging for willed bodies and exhumations. IThis laboratory handles a total of , Health Division Services&. The Health Division provides medical examinations' of c a s e s brought to ANL for study by the Center for Human Radiobiology. This includes the physical examinations, medical history, blood and urinalyses, skeletal x - rays, and summary report by a physician. 6 e . Equipment Obligations (In Thousands) Photo micro s cop e Bone Scanning Instrumentation System Automatic Sample Changer Whole Body Counter (for MIT subcontract) Optical Character Reader Solid State Detector Gas Counting System Graphic Furnace f o r Atomic Absorption Whole Body Counter Explanation of Equipment Items the amount of radium and other radionuclides in the large number of biological samples required by the expanded program for the Center for Human Radiobiology. The analyzer will automatically change samples and accumul a t e the data on computer compatible magnetic tape. This analyzer is needed to quantitatively determine

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BIOMEDICAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH Exposure to External and Internal Radiation - BUDGET ACTIWTY NO. A breakdown of manpower and cost distribution for each group is shown below: Scientific Man Years and Cost Radiation Damage t o Humans and Trace Elements in Man Metabolism and Distribution of Bone-Seeking Isotopes in Man Microscopic Analysis of Physical Assay of Bone Containing Deposited Radionuclides Purpose and Methods. search Division is responsible for scheduling examinations and for maintaining medical records of humans having significant body burdens of radioactivity. It searches for new cases, verifies histories of exposure to radium, arranges for medical and physical examinations of patients, maintains contact with cooperatin; institutions, procures samples i o r analysis and maintains the records. group a l s o operates the field station in Orange, New Jersey, where 2.0 scientific man years of effort are devoted to keeping track of dial painters from this area (oveand finding new cases for study. This group in the Radiological and Environmental Re-

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Accomplishments F Y 1972 and F Y 1973. During the past two years, this group has made appointments, 'arranged travel and escorted over 300 radium patients examined at the Center for Human Radiobiology. The names and present locations have been found for 250 new cases of persons employed in the radium industry (mostly since 1940), and 200 other persons have been identified by name but not yet verified as exposed to radium. More than 2000 s e t s of case histories and medical records obtained f r o m MIT, from previous Argonne investigators and from the New Jersey Radium Research Project have been integrated into a single filing system, and have been microfilmed for safekeeping and for easy handling. The files a r e being updated continually, as new information has been obtained through contacts with individuals, educational and research institutions, state departments of health, and vital records. Efforts a r e being made to identifi as fully as possible the exposed populations, especially in the dial-painting industry. The r e s u l t s of physical and medical examinations made at MIT and ANL since the start of the Center for Human Radiobiology (1969) have been abstracted f r o m written r e c o r d s and coded for inclusion in the computer data bank of results obtained earlier. The original files., x-rays, specimens and microscopic slides of the New J e r s e y Radium Research Project have been transferred to Argonne by the New Jersey State Department of Health. amined in detail and new data added to the CHR records; included a r e body burdens of radium for 130 persons not measured by MIT o r ANL. These acquisitions have been exAnticipated Program FY 1974 and F Y 1975. finding new c a s e s through personal contact and through additional investigation oi Continued effort will be devoted to industrial and medical u s e of radium. The updating and correcting of records will continue. The newly developed computerized information handling system will be used for making tabulations and intercomparisons of all available data including older data not in the present data s e t and for optimizing the o r d e r in which cases are scheduled o r recalled for examination. B. Dose-Effect Relationships for Radiation Damage to Humans Purpose and Methods. tionships between radiation dosage and damage to human tissue, especially in the The purpose of this program is to find quantitative relacase of malignancies produced by bone-seeking isotopes. The primary application is in setting maximum permissible levels of exposure t c ence with other nuclides, animal experiments, and knowledge of basic mechanism1 m u s t be utilized in this work. Epidemiological data may also provide insight as to whether a threshold for radiation damage exists at low levels of radioactivity. Information f r o m studies of radium toxicity in humans, experideath in the radium population, of the time distributions of deaths in the female dial painters to determine if nonspecific life shortening could be observed, and a preliminary comparison has been made of the toxicity of "*Ra in comparison t c the toxicity of 226Ra. Studies have been made of the causes ol The first two of these analyses appeared in the F Y 1972 Annual Report; the last will appear in the Proceedings of the Hanford SvmDosium.

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BIOMEDICAL AND ENWRONMENTAL RESEARCH Exposure to External and Internal Radiation - . BUDGET ACTIVITY NO. A comprehensive computer system for storing and processing data on the radium population has been designed and put into operation. terially aid these studies when the appropriate information has been obtained and The new system will mainduced sarcomas and the 226Ra-inducedhead carcinomas will be made with our Dose response studies of the radium enlarged population on completion of the encoding of the relevant data. Of p a r - ticular interest t o us is the time each individual in the study has been followed, in ccntrast t o the previous u s e of the time each individual has carried radium in have been, in general, those followed for the longest period of time. This selection m a y introduce a marked bias in dose response relationships, hence the need to evaluate the time each individual has been in the study. It h a s been determined that those with the highest radium burdens A considerable effort will be made to determine the history of children born to can be used to determille the effects of such irradiation on birth defects and childhood malignancies. Since over 1000 children w e r e born to women in this study, they could constitute a significant group on which to base the effects of These children, who received continual fetal-irradiation Autopsy and medical data coded by means of an expanded version of the Systematized Nomenclature of Pathology (SNOP) will be studied for correlation with radium bur dens. c. Environmental Radioactivity and T r a c e Elements in Man (R. B. Holtzman) Purpose and Methods. ' The objective of this,program is to make precise meas - ure ment s of the amounts of "'Ra, 210Pb,210Po,and Pb along with other radioactiv and stable trace elements in human tissue and excreta, and to correlate these with amounts in food, air, and water. large contribution t o the total natural radiation dose t o the human skeleton and fo its significance as an indicator of exposure to radioactivity in uranium mines. Radiochemical procedures, activation-analysis, and a variety of instrumental techniques are used ia this work. Lead-210 is of particular interest for its

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copper, manganese, and cadmium were measured in excreta, diet, air filter, blood, and hair samples which had been collected at Hines Hospital by Herta Spencer. While most of the t r a c e elements were in metabolic balance, the balance of '"Pb and 210Powere negative, i.e., more was excreted than taken in from the diet and atmosphere. An abstract describing these data has been submitted to the International Congress of the International Rad;-ation Protection Association. The radiation dose to uranium m i n e r s from 222Rnand its daughter products is of great interest for purposes of radioprotection. soft tissue, and blood collected by G. Saccomanno in Colorado have been analyzed for 'loPb and 210Po. The levels were much higher in miners (3 t o 8 0 pCi/liter in blood) than in nonminers (0.6 to 5 pCi 'loPb/liter). The mean ratio of the activities of 210Poto 210Pbappeared to be lower in miners (0.46) than in unexposed subjects (0.8) and in long-term 226Racases (0.7). bone tended to be accompanied by high 210Pbconcentrations in blood f r o m the same person but sufficient data are not yet available to determine whether meas - urements of blood provide a reliable measure of exposure to radon daughters in the air of uranium mines. Comparison between 210Pblevels in two miners me as - ured in vivo at New York University and those in bone specimens from these subjects showed good agreement (to within a factor of 2). More than 130 samples of bone, High 'lOPb concentrations in Anticipated Program FY 1974 and F Y 1975. Results already obtained on samples f r o m the Hines Hospital study will be evaluated. Measurements of Pb, 210Pb',a d 210Poin human tissues and biological samples will be directed toward studies of blood and autopsy specimens f r o m uranium miners. Trace elements in other autopsy samples will be analyzed for comparisons of concentration patterns with the health of the subject. These patterns will also help to characterize the meta, bolic properties of the radioactive nuclides of interest. D. Metabolism and Distribution of (Bone-Seeking) Isotopes in Man (J. Rundo Purpose and Methods. behavior a r e needed for estimation of radiation dose in studies of bone-seeking radionuclides in man. in part, by radon breath analysis. F o r 228Raand its decay products, and for the actinides, radiochemical analyses of surgical or autopsy samples a r e the only means of measurement when the levels are low o r when the nuclides emit low energy X-rays. The rate of change of body burden is determined by radiochemical a s s a y of urine, feces, and blood samples, while the distribution of radioactivit in body tissue is determined by similar analyses of material obtained at surgery Measurement of body burdens and knowledge of metabolic F o r 226Rain living humans, the body burden is determined content of blood, urine, and feces f r o m radium patients, 3 0 to 50 y e a r s after exposure, have been continued. About 400 specimens shipped f r o m MIT have been processed and are currently being analyzed for these nuclides.

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BIOMEDICAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH xposure to External and Internal Radiation - Analyses of 228Radaughters and 90Srhave been made on excreta f r o m a dial painter exposed to 90Sr. tions from exhumed cases. by another group. Average clearance rates of 226Ra,'l0Pb, and 'loPo from five high radium subjects in a metabolic ward have been measured. 0.72'10, and 3.770 per year for 226Ra, 210Pb,and 210Po,respectively, a r e lower than reported in other studies. day for 226Ra)than values previously reported. the power function retention model with an exponent of 0.44. The more than 200 bone specimens obtained f r o m a recently deceased radium dial painter, through the assistance of MIT, were sectioned, autoradiographed, the long bones, and the difference between bone types, were studied. Specific activities of the 226Rain bone varied by factors of 10 o r m o r e in an individuai bone. The 'loPb activities were fairly constant a t 0.3 those of the 226Ra,and the 210Powas in radioactive equilibrium with 'lOPb in cortex, but at 82% of this value in porous bone. The mean specific activity of 226Rain porous bone was about twice that in cortical bone. A study (with D. J. Simmons) of bone specimens f r o m the above subject showed a correlation coefficient of 0.79 (P < 0.Q:) between fraction of canals that a r e plugged and the 226Raconcentration of the respective section. Reports on these findings appeared in the F Y 1972 Annual Report. A radiochemical method based on the solvent extractior, of the 228Thdaughter, was used to show the presence of 228Rain dial painters previously believed not to have been exposed to this nuclide. A slightly less sensitive but more convenient method based on the electrostatic collection of daughters of deemanated 220Rn (thoron) is now being used to routinely make measurements of the 228Racontent of bone and excreta. Bone specimens from several subjects have been found to contain 228Ra in amounts which will substantially increase the estimates of radiation dose experienced by them. Methods were developed for the analysis in biological materials of 231Pa Preliminary determinations of the excretion rates of these nucLi''des were made 01 Radium-226 and 228Raa r e being analyzed in bone secAdjacent sections of bone a r e being autoradiographed The coefficients of excretion of 1.170, The clearance from blood is somewhat lower (54 liters / These results a r e consistent with The distributions of these nuclides along

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a person long contaminated with these nuclides. coefficients of excretion were each on the order of 1% per year, while for the 223Radaughter this r a t e was several percent per year. Blood and a complete 2-week sampling of excreta from a person with a long-terr 239Puburden were collected and as p a r t of a cooperative study, the 239Puwill be determined …