Question

While you were working in the radiation protection laboratory, four sources, alpha, beta, gamma and neutron, of various activities have been arriving, discuss in details how do you protect yourself and the other from radiation hazards.

Answer 1

Protection against radiation is of two types

1. EXTERNAL RADIATION PROTECTION

Which further gets divided into three basic methods to reduce the external radiation hazard are time, distance, and shielding. For better protection against radiation three must be optimized.

a) Time

The amount of radiation an individual accumulates depends upon how long an individual has stayed in the radiation zone .so, one needs to limit a person’s dose, one can restrict the time spent in the area.

b) Distance

Point sources of x- and gamma radiation follow the inverse square law, which means that the intensity of the radiation (I) decreases in proportion to the inverse of the distance from the source (d) squared.

c) Shielding

When reducing the time or increasing the distance may not be possible which generally happens in laboratory when you are studying the radioactive materials, so shielding material are used to reduce the external radiation hazard.

These material to be used in shielding depends upon the type of radiation and its energy-

• Alpha and Beta Radiation- Alpha particles can be easily shielded. even piece of paper ormore than a few cm of air is usually sufficient to stop them. so, alpha particles does not five much of  external radiation hazard. Whereas Beta particles are penetrate more as compared to alpha particles. shields are usually made of aluminum, brass, plasticetc.
• X and Gamma Radiation - Monoenergetic x- or gamma rays collimated into a narrow beam are attenuated exponentially through a shield..
• Neutrons - These are uncharged particle and do not produce ionozation directly only upon interaction with alpha , beta , gamma and Xrays. But they could be stopped using thick masses of concrete, water or paraffin.

2. INTERNAL RADIATION PROTECTION

when a body gets contaminated internally with a radionuclide. When radioactive materials enter into the body, they are metabolized and gets distributed over to the tissues.

The basic methods to control contamination are:

1. Isolation of the source of contamination.

2. separating the radioactive are from non-radioactive work areas.

3. Establishing and maintaining the contamination control zone.

4. Follow all the laboratory procedures. which means use of proper protective clothing, designated work areas, monitoring contamination, , etc.

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