Life Span of C57 Mice as Influenced by Radiation Dose, Dose Rate, and Age at Exposure

摘要

This study was designed to measure the life shortening of C57BL/6J male mice as a result of exposure to five external doses from exp 60 Co gamma radiation delivered at six different dose rates. Total doses ranged from 20 to 1620 rad at exposure rates ranging from 0.7 to 36,000 R/day. The ages of the mice at exposure were newborn, 2, 6, or 15 months. Two replications were completed. Although death was the primary endpoint, we did perform gross necropsies. The life span findings are variable, but we found no consistent shortening compared to control life spans. Therefore, we cannot logically extrapolate life shortening to lower doses, from the data we have obtained. In general, the younger the animals were at the beginning of exposure, the longer their life spans were compared to those of controls. This relationship weakened at the higher doses and dose rates, as mice in these categories tended not to have significantly different life spans from controls. Using life span as a criterion, we find this study suggests that some threshold dosage may exist beyond which effects of external irradiation may be manifested. Up to this threshold, there is no shortening effect on life span compared to that of control mice. Our results are in general agreement with the results of other researchers investigating human and other animal life span effects on irradiation. (ERA citation 08:010758)