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Studies have been performed on the use of shortwave radiation for cancer therapy and promoting wound healing, with some success. However, at a sufficiently high energy level, shortwave energy can be harmful to human health, potentially causing damage to biological tissues, for example by overheating or inducing electrical currents. [28]
Radiobiology is the study of the action of ionizing radiation on living things, including the health effects of radiation in humans. High doses of ionizing radiation can cause damage to living tissue such as radiation burning and harmful mutations such as causing cells to become cancerous, and can lead to health problems such as radiation ...
The ratio of a dose of high-LET radiation to a dose of x-rays or gamma rays that produce the same biological effect are called relative biological effectiveness (RBE) factors. The types of tumors in humans who are exposed to space radiation will be different from those who are exposed to low-LET radiation.
Dose equivalent calculates the effect of radiation on human tissue. [4] This is done using tissue weighting factor, which takes into account how each tissue in the body has different sensitivity to radiation. [4] The effective dose is the risk of radiation averaged over the entire body. [4] Ionizing radiation is known to cause cancer in humans. [4]
Acute radiation syndrome (ARS), also known as radiation sickness or radiation poisoning, is a collection of health effects that are caused by being exposed to high amounts of ionizing radiation in a short period of time. [1] Symptoms can start within an hour of exposure, and can last for several months.
Radiation is often categorized as either ionizing or non-ionizing depending on the energy of the radiated particles. Ionizing radiation carries more than 10 electron volts (eV), which is enough to ionize atoms and molecules and break chemical bonds. This is an important distinction due to the large difference in harmfulness to living organisms.
Ionizing radiation is not immediately detectable by human senses, so instruments such as Geiger counters are used to detect and measure it. However, very high energy particles can produce visible effects on both organic and inorganic matter (e.g. water lighting in Cherenkov radiation) or humans (e.g. acute radiation syndrome). [4]
Radiation poisoning, also called "radiation sickness" or a "creeping dose", is a form of damage to organ tissue due to excessive exposure to ionizing radiation. The term is generally used to refer to acute problems caused by a large dosage of radiation in a short period, though this also has occurred with long-term exposure to low-level radiation.