Patient application of these new sources of bombarding particles resulted in the creation of small quantities of hundreds of radioactive isotopic species, each with distinctive characteristics. In turn, as we shall see, many ways to use radioisotopes have been developed in medical therapy, diagnosis, and research. By now, more than 3000 hospitals hold licenses from the Atomic Energy Commission to use radioisotopes. In addition, many thousands of doctors, dentists, and hospitals have X-ray machines that they use for some of the same broad purposes. One of the results of all this is that every month new uses of radioisotopes are developed.
More persons are trained every year in methods of radioisotope use and more manufacturers are producing and packaging radioactive materials. This booklet tells some of the successes achieved with these materials for medical purposes.
What Is Radiation?
Radiation is the propagation of radiant energy in the form of waves or particles. It includes electromagnetic radiation ranging from radio waves, infrared heat waves, visible light, ultraviolet light, and X rays to gamma rays. It may also include beams of particles of which electrons, positrons, neutrons, protons, deuterons, and alpha particles are the best known.[4]
What Is Radioactivity?
It took several years following the basic discovery by Becquerel, and the work of many investigators, to systematize the information about this phenomenon. Radioactivity is defined as the property, possessed by some materials, of spontaneously emitting alpha or beta particles or gamma rays as the unstable (or radioactive) nuclei of their atoms disintegrate.
What Are Radioisotopes?
Frederick Soddy
In the 19th Century an Englishman, John Dalton, put forth his atomic theory, which stated that all atoms of the same element were exactly alike. This remained unchallenged for 100 years, until experiments by the British chemist, Frederick Soddy, proved conclusively that the element neon consisted of two different kinds of atoms. All were alike in chemical behavior but some had an atomic weight (their mass relative to other atoms) of 20 and some a weight of 22. He coined the word isotope to describe one of two or more atoms having the same atomic number but different atomic weights.[5]