A radiobiological basis for setting neutron radiation safety standards.

Abstract

Present neutron standards, adopted more than 20 yr ago from a weak radiobiological data base, have been in doubt for a number of years and are currently under challenge. Moreover, recent dosimetric re-evaluations indicate that Hiroshima neutron doses may have been much lower than previously thought, suggesting that direct data for neutron-induced cancer in humans may in fact not be available. These recent developments make it urgent to determine the extent to which neutron cancer risk in man can be estimated from data that are available. Two approaches are proposed here that are anchored in particularly robust epidemiological and experimental data and appear most likely to provide reliable estimates of neutron cancer risk in man. The first approach uses gamma-ray dose-response relationships for human carcinogenesis, available from Nagasaki (Hiroshima data are also considered), together with highly characterized neutron and gamma-ray data for human cytogenetics. When tested against relevant experimental data, this approach either adequately predicts or somewhat overestimates neutron tumorigenesis (and mutagenesis) in animals. The second approach also uses the Nagasaki gamma-ray cancer data, but together with neutron RBEs from animal tumorigenesis studies. Both approaches give similar results and provide a basis for setting neutron radiation safety standards. They appear to be an improvement over previous approaches, including those that rely on highly uncertain "maximum" neutron RBEs and unnecessary extrapolations of gamma-ray data to very low doses. Results suggest that, at the presently accepted neutron dose limit of 0.5 rad/yr, the cancer mortality risk to radiation workers is not very different from accidental mortality risks to workers in various nonradiation occupations. The neutron dose estimated to produce 2.5% lifetime risk (maximum radiation-induced risk presently accepted by the ICRP and NCRP for occupational exposure) is in the range 10-156 rad; the most probable dose is 30 rad, which is not very different from 25 rad, the presently accepted lifetime dose limit for fast neutrons.