Over the years both Dr. Miller and Dr. Beebe have been heavily involved in the research on the Japanese survivors of the atomic bombings in 1945. That experience serves as a major resource for scientific articles, lectures, and consultations on radiogenic cancer. In association with Dr Land, Dr Beebe has organized a study of liver cancer among the A-bomb survivors under investigation at the Radiation Effects Research Foundation (RERF) in Hiroshima and Nagasaki (RERF Research Protocol 5- 90). The current emphasis is on the effects of the Chernobyl accident in 1986. The activities of the Branch are coordinated with the Radiation Effects Branch and the Radiation Epidemiology Branch of DCE. The post- Chernobyl studies are directed by the Radiation Effects Branch. Topics of major interest include the effect of exposure to the radioiodines on thyroid cancer in children, sources of variation in individual sensitivity to the carcinogenic action of ionizing radiation, the contrast between high- and low-linear energy transfer (LET) radiation with respect to their carcinogenic effect on the liver, time-response characteristics of radiogenic cancers, and the influence of dose-rate and dose-fractionation on dose response. As the Departmental Representative to the Science Panel of the Committee on Interagency Radiation Research and Policy Coordination (a committee of the Federal Coordinating Council on Science, Engineering, and Technology, or FCCSET), Dr Beebe has been particu-larly involved in the effort to reach a Federal consensus on risk estimates for radiogenic cancer, and has urged that plans be made for research that might be carried out in the U.S. should a nuclear power plant disaster occur here.
