Radiation Studies and the Soviet Scientists in the Second Half of the 1950's

抄録

In those days when Yasushi Nishiwaki visited the Soviet Union, Soviet scientists stood at the crossroads in understanding radiation effects on the living body: their perspective was changing from that of a mere follower of Western studies to that of a radical critic. Looking for a disregarded context in which research on radiation effects emerged as a major topic in Soviet science, this paper aims to explain the indigenous needs for such research in the Soviet Union as well as its early development by shedding light on radiation casualties at a nuclear development center, Chelyabinsk-40 (later, -65) and hazard studies conducted there in the early years. This paper shows that, even before the fierce debate began in UNSCEAR in the summer of 1958, there had already been an internal drive within the Soviet Union for expanding research on radiation effects on humans and other organisms.