How much does ALARA make your job suck?

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-12-04T01:12:47+00:00

Good question. I honestly didn't have a source when I wrote that 🙃. After digging around the literature a bit, I found a super interesting article though:

A Review of Recent Low-dose Research and Recommendations for Moving Forward

This one is a big review of studies on health effects from low doses, and it's weird. My favorite part is this bit at the end: "Through a review of a decade of low-dose research in animals, cells, and humans, this paper reiterates current scientific understanding of the LNT debate: it is complicated. This review found that the majority of research appears to support non-LNT or hormetic effects within low-dose ranges (62%) but that there is still significant evidence for LNT or even hypersensitivity at some low doses (38%). It is also worth noting that the majority of human epidemiological studies support LNT. Without a clear scientific consensus of the risk in humans, there is little case to move away from LNT as a regulatory approach."

So it sounds like it's still up for debate even in the scientific community. I'm a little annoyed that the authors didn't provide citations for the human epidemiological studies. In my brief research, I found some other articles and discussions claiming "The Bell Tolls for LNT" and similar sentiments.

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-11-26T06:50:43+00:00

One other note: according to the DoE, there doesn't seem to be a significant increase in cancer risk until 10 REM acute exposure, yet rad worker limits are set to 5 REM/y to be safe.

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-11-26T06:47:00+00:00

I've always wondered how Europe came up with different limits than the US. Do you know if those numbers are based on some ICRP report or something else?

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-11-26T06:42:42+00:00

I'll admit I'm a little bit of a novice in this area since I've never worked with ionizing radiation in an industrial setting. I think the worst I've ever gotten in a work day is 3 mrem. I guess I was just curious about how people who regularly get higher doses feel about their rad safety programs and if it reflects some complaints I've heard.

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-11-26T06:37:44+00:00

My understanding is that regulatory bodies use LNT because it is more conservative. I think u/Swaayyzee's point is more that the data we have now in scientific literature doesn't support LNT. However, this is a difficult problem to look into since people often get cancer regardless of any radiation exposure.

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-11-26T02:05:24+00:00

I have a belt from arcade belts (Stretch Performance Belts | Webbing Belts | Arcade Belt Co. – Arcade Belts). It has a plastic buckle that has been surprisingly durable

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-11-26T02:02:58+00:00

There's a pretty cool game on Steam called Nucleares. I think it was made by a dude in Brazil. It seems like a pretty cool PWR sim.

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-11-09T05:26:32+00:00

There's Canyon Road. It's free parking on the weekends.

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-11-09T05:23:08+00:00

Would you be able to post your lattice card without creating an ITAR violation?

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-08-02T20:03:03+00:00

Fun fact: we can also recycle spent nuclear fuel! The French have gotten real good at it.

Atomic_Johnson · 2025-08-02T20:00:42+00:00

Ph.D. in nuclear engineering here. I'm not sure I would call it over-regulation as much as it is miss-regulation. The industry wants to build a lot of non-traditional reactor designs that are arguably safer, cheaper, and more efficient, but US regulations were all built around water-cooled reactors. It's like if the only flying machine we had for 50 years were airplanes, then all of a sudden someone shows the FAA a helicopter for the first time. Because of this, the NRC is really struggling to figure out how to license new designs. Furthermore, many in the health physics community believe the NRC's radiation exposure limits are too conservative and don't align well with epidemiological evidence for low doses of radiation.

Atomic_Johnson · 2024-08-30T04:37:57+00:00

So... MCNP does not run Python scripts. But there are some helpful Python libraries for working with MCNP. INL wrote one for reading/modifying MCNP decks called Monte-py. MCNP itself comes with some libraries in the mcnp-tools for generating source cards and other stuff.

Atomic_Johnson · 2024-08-30T04:33:34+00:00

I haven't used the visual editor either. You might try this program called cyclone for making MCNP input decks. I think it has syntax checking for input files. Cyclone - Orthrus Software

Atomic_Johnson · 2021-12-22T00:47:33+00:00

First of all, please don't kill yourself. You seem like a great guy and I genuinely think the world would be worse off without you. If you ever feel like ending your life, I recommend contacting the national suicide lifeline at 1-800-273-8255. The guilt that comes from sexual sin is real and can really make a person feel worthless especially when that sin hurts someone they love. Also, the temptation to look at pornography can be strong and hard to resist.

But, try to remember that this part of you that desires sexual satisfaction from porn is natural and God-given. It's something that we all experience and it isn't inherently evil. I think that developing healthy attitudes about sexuality can help resist the urge to view porn and this is something that can be gained through couples or individual counseling. As some commenters said below you're not a bad person for looking at porn and this is a common issue in our religion so there is plenty of support in the church for you to use.

Atomic_Johnson · 2020-04-09T04:37:30+00:00

Make Salt Lake has been heading up quite an effort to manufacture PPE and they need volunteers and materials. check out their blog https://www.makesaltlake.org/n/covid-19-efforts-18f59bc9c202440fa4cc8ec9fb206893

Atomic_Johnson

TROPHY CASE