Re: Mice and elephants, > and elephants

["John Moulder" <jmoulder@post.its.mcw.edu>]

>      So does a 1 Sv exposure lead to higher risks of radiation 
>      induced cancers in sumo wrestlers than in jockeys or not???  
>      (my version of what I think was the original question - it's been 
>      a while) 

If sumo wrestlers have more dividing cells that jockeys (but I don't think 
they do) and a similar life expectancy (which also I don't think they do), 
they your supposition might be correct

>      Seriously, one point is clear from the excellent and 
>      thought provoking response below by Paul Unrau:  many of us 
>      are involved with practical applications of radiation 
>      protection (meaning we no longer have close ties with academia).

On your more serious note:
  
Your are correct, there appears to be an increasing gulf between radiation 
safety and radiation biology.  My experience is that most radiation safety 
people are not up-to-date on radiation biology, and there is no real mechanism 
for keeping them up-to-date.  Health Physics and Radiaiton Biology appear to 
have become two entirely separate fields, with Medical Physics somewhere in 
between.

some examples:

- how many of us attend meeting of Radiation Research, HPS and AAPM (or the 
European equivalents).  How many of us attend at least two of the three, or 
are even members of more than one of these professional societies.

- when was the last time there was a joint meeting of any of these societies 
(the mid-70's joint meeting of Rad Res and HPS in San Francisco is the last 
one I'm aware of).

- how many biologists participate regularly in this mailing list?

- how many of the RSOs on this list have taken a course in radiation biology, 
from a real radiation biologist, in the last decade?  In all fairness, most 
radiation biologists are not adequately trained to do radiation safety either.