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Radiation And Modern Life: Fulfilling Marie Curie's Dream

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I have worked as a physicist in the nuclear field for just over 30 years. Since my work has been of a very narrow specialized nature, I never kept myself fully up-to-date on the incredible diversity of uses for nuclear technology. Consequently, reading this book was indeed an eye-opener for me. The author, a nuclear engineer, discusses a variety of uses of nuclear technology in a wide range of areas, including agriculture, medicine, power generation, industry, transportation, space exploration, public safety, arts and sciences, environmental protection and modern economy. Writing in a very chatty style, the author is quite detailed in most of his descriptions, but he interspersed them with several personal anecdotes, thus adding to one's reading enjoyment. Although an early chapter contains basic information on radiation, i.e., its nature, sources, means of measurement and health risks, a reader who is completely unfamiliar with the subject matter may find a few passages in the book a bit harder to follow. However, these passages are few such that this most informative and well-written book can be enjoyed by a very wide audience. I highly recommend it!

The tenor of the book is sincerely enthusiastic. It reminded me of my youth, when from a yearbook of science and technology I learnt that with nuclear power plants, we could expect electricity for practically no fuel. As an engineering student I learnt, as if that was a law of the solar system, that electricity consumption increases immutably, by 8% per year. Also familiar from my youth, over half a century ago, is the idea of desalination plants to irrigate deserts in proximity of oceans. Waltar reports that desalination requires a lot of energy, but that nuclear power can now provide that, and even produce nuclear-based electricity and drinking water simultaneously in one integrated plant. Other ideas that could not fail to impress me are the elimination of most of the nuclear waste disposal problem by using breeder reactors which recycle waste into new fuels, and the use of antimatter power in space flight, which would be ten billion times more efficient than chemical power like from a Saturn V booster rocket. Fission power as now used in some places on Earth is only ten million times more efficient.
What the cost of all that efficiency might be, Waltar does not aim to explain. Opposition to radiation technologies is mentioned rarely and mostly condescendingly. To convince consumers that radiation in our lives cannot be rolled back, he lumps informational applications of radiation and nuclear power together into the radiation technologies industry, which is bigger than General Motors (in terms of "economic impact", by plain sales it would not be). Jobs created by radiation technologies are shown off, but jobs lost with the industries or occupations displaced are not mentioned. And he points out that radiation is all over the universe. This is a fact - but not a relevant one: We humans are here, with other living beings, only because we have an atmosphere that protects us from the harshness of the rest of the universe. Waltar covers many technical and historical details by referring to other publications, keeping the book reasonably easy to read for ordinary literate people, though rich in scope. Studies cited about the harmlessness and even purported health benefits of low level radiation were typically done in remote countries (or in military secrecy) under difficult record-keeping circumstances, and are viewed sceptically by careful life scientists, in contrast to physicists and engineers like Waltar. In potential public impact, the book is a major challenge.

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Dr Waltar has writen an excellent book on radiation, its sources and uses. It is a very easily understood introduction for anyone interested in the subject and is especially useful in understanding the medical uses of radiation. The chapter on Electricity and nuclear power puts into perspective the costs and issues related to its expanded use. Other uses of radiation in industry are also well described. The book should be read by any person wanting to get a reasonably balance view of this phenomenon in which we live, how it affects our lives and has been put to beneficial use - perhaps aleviating some of the fears that not knowing has promoted.

This was an excellent book to read for any lay person or student on the many uses of ionizing radiation in modern life. It was amazing to learn of the many applications and benefits we have received as a result of radiation, and Prof. Waltar did an excellent job providing this information in a very readable narrative explaining the benefits as well as short comings of radiation. This book covers the benefits of nuclear medicine, nuclear power, agriculture, transportation, water, waste lean up, the arts, scientific exploration of space and more. Great Job! Fun to read!

HAd to have this as a Textbook for ME136N at the University of Texas via correspondence study from Oklahoma State University as ENGR 4211. I learned little from it, if you don't know anything about nuclear engineerng, you can learn a great deal from this book.

Very interesting book for someone who are interested in the history and applications of radioactivity. Very good as element of motivation to study this specific field of science. Good source for preparing a lecture.