Leveraging Advances in Modern Science to Revitalize Low-Dose Radiation Research in the United States (2022) / Chapter Skim
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4 Status of Low-Dose Radiation Research
4 Status of Low-Dose Radiation Research
Pages 97-126
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4.1 LOW-DOSE RADIATION RESEARCH IN THE U.S. GOVERNMENT A few federal agencies within the United States have programs that support or conduct research on low-dose radiation relevant to the agency's specific missions.
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about its role in low-dose radiation research but did not receive a response. To the best of the committee's knowledge, NSF does not support or conduct research in radiation health.
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Notably, the Biological Systems Science Division, the division within DOE's Office of Science tasked with establishing the low-dose radiation program, issued its strategic planning report in April 2021 (DOE, 2021a) and did not mention the mandate from Congress to reestablish the low-dose radiation program.
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In 2021, the same three DOE national laboratories received an additional $4.5 million to continue work on the RadBio-AI project.3 In both years, the grants to the national laboratories to support this project were non-competitive, non-peer reviewed, and solicitation was not made to the broad scientific community. Office of Health and Safety The mission of the Office of Health and Safety includes establishing DOE worker safety and health policy; conducting health studies to determine worker and public health effects from exposure to hazardous materials associated with DOE operations; implementing medical surveillance and screening programs for current and former workers; and supporting the operation and maintenance of several registries including the Comprehensive Epidemiologic Data Resource, the U.S.
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, and on the residents of the communities surrounding this facility, specifically the population living near the Techa River. • The Japan Program, which supports studies of the Japanese atomic bombing survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki carried out at the Radiation Effects Research Foundation (RERF; see Section 4.5.6)
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. Following the closing of the LBNL Bevalac accelerator, NASA and DOE signed agreements to ensure that beams of high-energy heavy ions continued to be available to simulate space radiation for physics and radiobiology research.
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The committee did not examine the effectiveness of the system. NOTE: AI = artificial intelligence; ALSDA = Ames Life Sciences Data Archive; API = application programming interface; DB = database; DoD = Department of Defense; ML = machine learning; NIH = National Institutes of Health.
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Radiation Epidemiology Branch, NCI REB's mission is to identify and quantify the risk of cancer in populations exposed to medical, occupational, or environmental radiation, and to advance understanding of radiation carcinogenesis. Some priority research areas within REB are quantifying the magnitude of the cancer risk at low doses and the impact of dose and dose rate, identifying the most radiosensitive populations, understanding the dose response for cardiovascular disease or cataracts, and pairing epidemiological studies with molecular studies to understand the mechanisms of radiation-related carcinogenesis.
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. RNCP's short-term focus is on triage and treatment of life-threatening, high-dose radiation exposures, and its long-term focus is on delayed effects of acute radiation exposure with limited focus on cancer (which is the primary focus of NCI)
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4.1.4 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention The committee received briefings from two offices within CDC that support low-dose radiation research: NIOSH and CDC's Radiation Studies Section. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health NIOSH's mission is to develop new knowledge relevant to occupational safety and health and to transfer that knowledge into practice.
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Exposures to radiation of public health interest include medical exposures, environmental exposures, occupational exposures, and exposures from accidents or acts of terrorism. The Radiation Studies Section carries out work to find out what information 12 The shift of the responsibility for epidemiological studies of radiation health effects from DOE to HHS was recommended by the independent Secretarial Panel for the Evaluation of Epidemiological Research Activities (SPEERA, 1990)
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A report from the Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council concluded that performing substantive work in this area will first require changes in institutional culture and a reorienting of staff expertise, but it identified several opportunities for additional or expanded roles for AFRRI including in preparedness and response to nuclear or radiological emergencies, management of psychological effects associated with a nuclear or radiological emergency, development and management of DoD radiation protection instrumentation, workforce education for radiation professionals, and support of radiation epidemiology and risk research (IOM and NRC, 2014)
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. It recommends establishment of an interagency coordination mechanism within the federal government and with international partners for low-dose radiobiology research, with the overall goal to promote communication and a course of research that reduces uncertainty in risk estimates for adverse health outcomes and establishes the shape of the dose-response curve for adverse health outcomes at low doses and low dose rates of radiation (NSTC, 2022)
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An unlikely radiation research agency, it recently launched the Targeted Evaluation of Ionizing Radiation Exposure (TEI-REX) program to establish novel minimally invasive biodosimetry methods for low doses of radiation (defined as doses below 0.75 Gy)
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During the previous low-dose program, national laboratories (primarily LBNL, ORNL, and PNNL) received about 60 percent of the total low-dose radiation program funding from DOE to conduct research in three scientific focus areas:18 1.
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The NASA Space Radiation Laboratory at BNL develops computational models, methodologies, and biological models to support NASA's missions, but these tools also have some applications at low doses. BNL also supports testing of electronic equipment (often the components of satellites)
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4.4.1 National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements The mission of the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP) is to support radiation protection by providing independent scientific analysis, information, and consensus recommendations.
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and were broken down into nine broad areas as follows: nuclear fuel cycle and nuclear power production, radiation protection through improved estimates of radiation effects and risk at low doses, use of radiation for medical care, improved measurement of radiation through instrument development, decontamination and decommissioning of nuclear facilities, exploration of 19 AOP is a conceptual framework developed by the Organisation for Economic Co-opera tion and Development (OECD) to describe a sequence of causally linked events that occur in response to a stressor and lead to an adverse health outcome relevant to risk-based evaluations and management, and regulatory decision-making.
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. In this statement, ANS notes that the LNT model used in radiation protection may not adequately describe the relationship between harm and exposure and that long-term research in low-level radiation exposure is needed to improve risk-informed decision-making.
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and has working groups to address research infrastructure needs as well as education and training. From 2015 to 2020, CONCERT was operating as an umbrella structure for the research initiatives of several European radiation protection research platforms including MELODI.
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4.5.3 United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation UNSCEAR has been involved in examination of radiation effects for more than 60 years and has provided reports on a variety of radiationrelated topics including effects and risks from ionizing radiation, epidemiological evaluation of radiation-induced cancers, biological effects at low radiation doses, combined effects of radiation and other agents, and levels and effects of radiation exposure following the Chernobyl and Fukushima accidents. In 2021, UNSCEAR published a report that examined biological mechanisms relevant to the inference of cancer risks following low-dose and low-dose-rate exposures, dose-response relationships, integration of data at different levels of organization, and modeling of cancer mechanisms, and offered directions for future research.
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the application/ Ecosystem protection. implementation of Research needs for the application of the system of radiological radiation protection protection.
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Coordination and cooperation among member countries is central to the agency's mission. In 2018, participants of an NEA/OECD scoping meeting concluded that global coordination in low-dose radiation research has the potential to improve cost-effectiveness and efficiency, increase international awareness of research, and facilitate data sharing and access to unique facilities.
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. Canadian Organization on Health Effects from Radiation Exposure In 2020, Health Canada in partnership with CNSC established COHERE (Canadian Organization on Health Effects from Radiation Exposure)
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TABLE 4.3 Research Themes Under the COHERE Strategic Research Agenda Globalized Cancer Non-Cancer Data Sharing/ Capacity Epidemiological Themes Effects Effects Consolidation Building Studies Research Conduct mechanistic-based Develop Test new Link lines studies to examine dose- expertise technologies/ occupational response relationships and in the area approaches data to cancer/ links to adverse outcomes of data for identifying mortality data management low-dose and response interpretation effects Priority Lung cancer Cataracts Adverse Optical International areas (radon) , (high and outcome spectroscopy, pooled studies, kidney low linear pathway, 3D organoid uranium miners, cancer energy systematic models, other radon (uranium)
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The scientific questions to be addressed by the program are driven by public concerns regarding low doses of radiation as identified by a social science project undertaken by the Centre for the Study of Science and Innovation Policy within the University of Saskatchewan. The representative who briefed the committee noted that the program is expected to generate information that can be used by those responsible for radiation protection and industry.
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Analyses of the atomic bombing survivor cohorts have identified radiation health effects, primarily for cancer mortality and cancer incidence, at higher doses with relative confidence (Grant et al., 2017; Ozasa et al.,
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First, statistical uncertainties in health effects at low doses must account for errors that arise due to uncertainty in dosimetry parameters and measurement error in radiation exposure data. Currently, dose estimates for atomic bombing survivors do not fully account for all these sources of uncertainty.
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125 SOURCE: Robert Ullrich, Radiation Effects Research Foundation, presentation to the committee on January 24, 2022.
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Some offices within these agencies have relevant expertise but the research they support is primarily on higher doses and exposures. National laboratories have traditionally been a vital component of DOE's research capabilities, including radiation research, enabling teams of scientists spanning biology, chemistry, physics, and computation to tackle scientific questions and develop technologies deployed nationally and internationally.
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