Radiobiology: Concepts and basic principles

Abstract

Very soon after the discovery of radiation and radioactivity short- and long-term negative effects of radiation on human tissue were observed. Adverse effects of X-rays were observed by Thomas Edison, William J. Morton, and Nikola Tesla; they independently reported eye irritations from experimentation with X-rays and fluorescent substances. These effects were thought to be eye strain, or possibly due to exposure to ultraviolet radiation. Elihu Thomson (an American physicist) deliberately exposed the little finger of his left hand to X-rays for several days, for a short time each day, and observed pain, swelling, stiffness, erythema, and blistering in the finger, which was clearly and immediately related to the radiation exposure. William Herbert Rollins (a Boston dentist) demonstrated that X-rays could kill guinea pigs and result in the death of offspring when guinea pigs were irradiated while pregnant. Henri Becquerel received a skin burn from a radium source given to him by the Curies that he carried in a vest pocket at times. He once was reported to have said: I love this radium but I have a grudge against it! The first death in an X-ray pioneer attributed to cumulative overexposure was to C.M. Dally in 1904. Radiologists and other physicians who used X-rays in their practices before health physics practices were common had a significantly higher rate of leukemia than their colleagues. A particularly tragic episode in the history of the use of radiation and in the history of industrialism was the acute and chronic biological damage suffered by the Radium Dial Painters [1]. Radium was used in luminous paints in the early 1900s. In factories where luminous dial watches were made, workers (mainly women) would sharpen the tips of their paint brushes with their lips, and thus ingested large amounts of radium. They had increased amounts of bone cancer (carcinomas in the paranasal sinuses or the mastoid structures, which are very rare, and were thus clearly associated with their exposures, as well as cancers in other sites) and even spontaneous fractures in their jaws and spines from cumulative radiation injury. Others died of anemia and other causes. © 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.