Nurture With Ionizing Radiation: A Provocative Hypothesis

• Published in: Nutrition and cancer 1999-01, Vol.34 (1), p.1-11
• Main Author: Luckey, Thomas D.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Animals; Biological and medical sciences; Carcinogenesis, carcinogens and anticarcinogens; Humans; Medical sciences; Neoplasms - prevention & control; Physical agents; Radiation, Ionizing; Tumors; Whole-Body Irradiation
• ISSN: 0163-5581; 1532-7914
• DOI: 10.1207/S15327914NC340101

Whole body exposure to low-dose ionizing radiation appears to decrease overall cancer incidence. The data come from at least eight large studies of populations exposed to various forms of radioactive material and from more limited studies of occupational and environmental exposures to plutonium, radium, and radon. Earlier experiments in animals strongly support the protective effect that is apparent in humans. Also, experimental reports from invertebrates kept in radiation-deficient conditions suggest that ionizing radiation is essential for optimal growth and development. The combined evidence points to the presence of no-adverse-effect thresholds and of hormesis or beneficial effects at doses below those thresholds. Furthermore, according to the geological record, the high background radiation under which life first evolved has progressively attenuated up to the present. Thus it is intriguing to postulate that modern humans may live under conditions of partial deficiency of ionizing radiation; low doses of ionizing radiation may likely function as inducers of repair and detoxification mechanisms, much as low-level antigenic challenges are responsible for enhanced immune competence. This hypothesis runs contrary to the prevailing consensus of regulatory default assumptions, which negate the possibility of no-effect thresholds for agents that are carcinogenic at certain levels of exposure. Still, those are dogmatic policy assumptions without scientific or even empirical justification, whereas the hypothesis advanced here has consistent observational and experimental support. The implication is that a partial deficiency of ionizing radiation could be remedied by a safe supplementation, possibly through dietary means. Dose-response data from studies of nuclear workers and populations subjected to unusual exposures suggest that safe supplementation with about 0.4 cGy/mo would be beneficial and conservative.