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Re: "Tritium on Ice"
This is obviously a general comment to all that expressed interest in tritium.
Those of us in research know that "Every 25 years someone reinvents the wheel."
Similarly, the interest in tritium toxicity reaches a peak about the same as
it's half-life. Incidently, for a few years (beginning in 1940) the accepted
value for the half-life of tritium was approximately 31 years. Paper published
in Phys Rev 58:574,1940 - P.S. The measurements were taken with a contaminated
counter.
For an early review of tritium, see "TRITIUM" - An 807 page proceedings of a
tritium symposium held in 1971 at Las Vegas. It is registered by TID Oak Ridge
conf-710809. Most of the subjects in this thread are covered there. It has a
great introduction by W.F. Libby, "History of Tritium".
For a later review see Tritium in the Environment", Carsten, A.L., ADVANCES IN
RADIATION BIOLOGY - Vol 8, 1979. (Over 100 refs)
For a still later review see 'TRITIUM" - Special Issue of Health Physics 65: 6,
1993. There may be a more recent one. Following the pattern of rebirth of
interest in tritium toxicity, it seems it is about due.
As to the question of why study the toxicity of tritium, what is known etc. Here
is a little TRITOX history.
In the late 60's I was called by AEC/ERDA (whatever the name was at that time)
to attend a meeting in the Directors Office at Oak Ridge to discuss plans for a
major effort to examine the possible health effects (somatic and genetic) of
exposure to tritium. As result of the discussions I was asked to establish a
TRITOX program at Brookhaven as a followup to other radiation biology programs
in progress here.. As part of this program, and a fusion energy collaborative
program with Japan, a number of senior Japanese scientists came to BNL to work
on TRITOX for periods of 1-2 years. The Japanese became very intersted,.
established several TRITOX programs in Japan and hosted three workshops under
the title "Tritium Radiobiology and Health Physics" in 1982, 85 and 89.
Proceedings published as NIRS -M-41 and 52 (Natl. Inst of Rad. Sciences,chiba)
and IPPI - REV - 3 (Inst. of Plasma Physics, Nagoya). Several US scientists also
took part in these collaborative efforts at Brookhaven. Our program at BNL
remained active until the 90's.
For summaries of some of the work done at BNL. which seem to follow the
interests expressed by this group, see:
General abstract ---Carsten etal RAD. RES.55, 543,1973
Cytogenetics effects related to tritium: ----- Carsten etal RAD. RES .
68:480-89,l976
Dom. Lethal Mutations. Carsten and Cummerford RAD. RES 66;609-14,1976
Genetic and Late Somatic Effects, Carsten etal Cur. Topics In RAd. Res Quart
12: 212-224,1977
Dist. of tritium in amino acids and proteins in trtium exposed mice,
Cummerfdord, Carten Rad Res 94:151-55,1983
Tritium/sister chromaid exchanges. Ikushima, Carsten- Int. J. Rad. Biol.
45:251-56,1984
Turnover of tritium in cell nuclei,chromatin,DNA and histone Cummerford, Carsten
Rad Res92:521-529,1982
TRITOX program at BNL. Carsten, Ann. NY Acad of Sc. 459:258-269,1985
Tritium distribution in gylcogen, hemoglobin and chromatin from tritium in
drinking water. Rad.Res. 72:333-342,1977
Tritium-long term exposure effects - Carsten, Immun. and Hematology Res
3:38-44;1984
Tritium effects on oocytes - Mailhes, Carsten,Benz - ad. Res 111:438-44,1987
Tritium radiobiology and RBEs. Straume and Carsten, Health Physics J. 65:6,
657-672-1993
I think the info in these papers, the review articles, conf. proceedings, etc.
should answer most of the questions about tritium toxicity.
The problem is that computer searchs don't go back far enough to show many of
the studies where the info exists.
P.S. At the end of the Oak Ridge meeting (late 60's) which resulted in funding
several big TRITOX programs, I told the funding agencies that they were
"talking big bucks to set up special rooms, 'megamouse' experiments, etc." They
responded that, "we're talking big results soon". I asked the question of "why
the sudden interest in tritium toxicity" Their answer was "Within a year those
guys at Princeton will have fusion on line and there will be tons of tritium to
deal with!!!!!"
So much for rushing fusion.
Arland (Red) Carsten, Ph.D.
Jerry Cohen wrote:
> I am curious to know if anyone knows or can conceive of a plausible
> situation where release of tritium to the environment could result in a
> significant radiological public health problem (excluding problems of mental
> health, regulatory compliance, or anything related to perceived risk).
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Ralph E. Wild <rewild@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
> To: Norman Cohen <ncohen12@comcast.net>
> Cc: <radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu>; <Know_Nukes@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Monday, September 30, 2002 12:07 PM
> Subject: Re: New book: "Tritium on Ice"
>
> > >
> > >
> > >> Thus, the alleged consensus amounted basically to an opinion by a
> single person.
> > >>
> > Sorta overlooks the EIS on construction of new tritium production
> > reactor(s) by DOE, the EIS on accelerator production of triutim, ant the
> > EIS on use of civilian reactors for tritium production. I doubt that
> > this one person wrote all of these three environmental impact statements
> > or that she retrieved all of the copies from all of the public reading
> > rooms.
> >
> > Ralph E. Wild
> > URS Corporation
> >
> > ************************************************************************
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