Irradiation Experiments and Analyses of the Low Dose Radiation on the Raphanus sativus

Abstract

  Recently, the researches on radiation hormesis toward the animals and plants are made abundantly. The radiation hormesis effect is that subharmful doses of radiation may evoke a stimulatory response in any organism. We did irradiation experiments of fusion (DD and DT) neutron, thermal and fast neutron, and 60-cobalt gamma-ray to the dry seeds of Raphanus stivus, and examined whether radiation hormesis effects appeared by measuring germination rate, the length of a hypocotyl and a root and the total weight on the 7th day from starting cultivation. The evaluation of radiation hormesis effects was done by using relative effectiveness which is the ratio of the mean of the measurement objects of the irradiation group to that of non-irradiation group. In the Raphanus stivus the radiation hormesis effects of the measured objects were only turned up in seed groups irradiated by the fusion (D-T) neutron. We have confirmed that absorbed dose range where the effects are revealed is from 1 cGy to 10 Gy and there the relative effectiveness is from 1.05 to 1.25. In this research the model about radiation hormesis effect on Raphanus sativus confirmed in irradiation of D-T neutrons is proposed. And it is apparent that radiation from radio activated seeds influences hormesis effect on Raphanus sativus.