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Martin Šefl received an award from the Czech Society for Radiation Protection for his paper “Inhalation of soluble plutonium: 53-year follow-up of Manhattan Project worker,” which was published in the peer-reviewed journal Health Physics. The award was for the best work written by a young scientist in the field of radiation protection. His paper models the biokinetics of plutonium in a Registrant who was one of 26 Manhattan Project workers known informally as the “UPPU Club.” This group of plutonium-exposed workers were followed up by Los Alamos National Laboratory on a regular basis. Mr. Šefl’s work determined that the worker inhaled a … » More …

Maia Avtandilashvili was appointed as a member of the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP) Scientific Committee (SC) 6-13 on methods and models for estimating organ doses from intakes of radium, and Sergei Tolmachev will serve as a subject matter expert for the committee. SC-13 will prepare a commentary that will discuss approaches for determining organ doses following intakes of radium. It will also describe methods for assessing uncertainties associated with dose assessments, and for estimating doses to workers without measurement data, based upon doses to workers with measurement data and similar work histories.

A PhD candidate from the School of the Environment at WSU is conducting part of his research at the USTUR’s radiochemistry laboratory. Alexander Reyes is studying the amount of selenium in organisms collected from Omak Lake, the largest saltwater lake in Washington State. The lake is highly alkaline, which highly favors production of selenate ions in surface waters. Mr. Reyes’ research will assess the uptake of and bioaccumulation of selenium in organisms through different trophic levels of the food web, including various types of zooplankton, midges, invertebrates, and fish. Samples collected from Omak Lake were acid … » More …

During 2020, COVID restrictions meant that USTUR staff largely worked from home, and many scientific conferences were cancelled. Indeed, this slowed down certain operational aspects of the Registries, such as analyzing tissues for actinides. However, it also provided an unexpected opportunity for faculty to focus on research involving existing data. During 2021 alone, USTUR faculty have been preparing 11 papers for publication in scientific journals. Six will have a USTUR faculty member as the lead author, and six have already been submitted to and/or published in a journal. Additionally, scientific conferences have resumed using virtual, in-person, or hybrid formats. So far this year, USTUR faculty … » More …