Pacific Northwest Laboratory annual report for 1991 to the DOE Office of Energy Research. Part 1, Biomedical sciences

Abstract

This report summarizes progress in OHER biological research and general life sciences research programs conducted at PNL in FY 1991. The research develops the knowledge and scientific principles necessary to identify, understand, and anticipate the long-term health consequences of energy-related radiation and chemicals. Our continuing emphasis is to decrease the uncertainty of health risk estimates from existing and newly developed energy-related technologies through an increased understanding of the ways in which radiation and chemicals cause biological damage. The sequence of this report of PNL research reflects the OHER programmatic structure. The first section, Biological Research, contains reports of biological research in laboratory animals and in vitro cell systems, including research with radionuclides and chemicals. The next section, General Life Sciences Research, reports research conducted for the OHER human genome research program. Biological Research Lifespan studies in beagles with inhaled 239pu(NO3)4were in the 14th postexposure year. Thus far, 28 of 96 exposed clogs had bone tumors, 31 had lung tumors, and 9 had intrahepatic bile duct tumors. Because lung tumors were the primary plutonium exposure-related cause of death in the 239puO2-exposed dogs (51 of 116 dogs), four methods for calculating radiation close to the lungs were compared to evaluate uncertainties in radiation dose estimates. Comparisons of mean accumulative average radiation dose to the lungs were not statistically different among the four different methods, and the fraction of dogs with lung tumors for the four highest dose-range groups was similar for each method of dose calculation. Other plutonium exposure-related effects included sclerosis of the tracheobronchial lymph nodes, lymphopenia, focal radiation pneumonitis, focal dystrophic osteolytic lesions in bone, adenomatous hyperplasia of the liver, and serum chemistry indicating liver damages. General Life Sciences Research PNL is developing a computer information system to graphically display and manipulate the vast amounts of information about the human genome. The user interface, named GnomeView, provides researchers with graphical representations of chromosomes, genetic and physical maps, and DNA sequences. The architecture of the GnomeView interface has been implemented. The test set of maps for superoxide dismutase as abstracted earlier manually from Human Genome Mapping Library, GenBank, and the literature have been, for the most part, supplemented with direct access capabilities to resident abstractions of GenBank and Genome Data Base. PNL biomedical research is an interdisciplinary effort requiring scientific contributions from many research departments at PNL.

Natural radiation sources, including some lessons for nuclear waste management

“…A nonlinear dose-effect relationship has been observed after inhalation of oxide of 239 Pu by a rat [9] or inhalation of 239 Pu or 238 Pu oxide by dogs [10,11]. This phenomenon is also observed in humans for bone cancers induced at low dose rates by 226 Ra [12][13][14], and according to some, after inhalation of plutonium oxide by workers at the Mayak complex [15].…”

Le stockage définitif des déchets radioactifs et la radioprotection

“…Au niveau du risque, nous savons que les émetteurs alpha peuvent conduire à des réponses différentes de la relation linéaire sans seuil (Raabe et al, 1983(Raabe et al, , 1981Park, 1992Park, , 1990Sanders et al, 1993Sanders et al, , 1991Hohryakov et Romanov, 1994). L'observation des ostéosarcomes chez les peintres de cadran lumineux montre que la relation dose-effet ne répond pas à une relation linéaire sans seuil comme le montre la figure 1 (Evans et al, 1974 ;Rowland et al, 1978 ;Rowland, 1995) alors que les carcinomes des sinus de la face et des maxillaires sont plus proches d'une représentation linéaire.…”