Russian Health Studies Program
Overview

What is the Russian Health Studies Program?

The Department of Energy's (DOE) Russian Health Studies Program was developed to assess worker and public health risks from radiation exposure resulting from nuclear weapons production activities in the former Soviet Union.

What are the Program's Goals?

The goals of this program are to:

1. Clarify the relationship between health effects and chronic, low-to-medium dose radiation exposures;

2. Estimate cancer risks from exposure to gamma, neutron, and alpha radiation; and

3. Provide information to the national and international organizations that determine radiation protection standards and practices.

What kind of research is conducted?

Presently, DOE supports epidemiologic studies, radiation dose reconstruction studies, molecular and radiobiological studies, and a tissue repository. All research is focused on workers at the Mayak Production Association (Mayak), which is Russia's first nuclear weapons production facility, and on the residents of the communities surrounding this facility. In 2005, these researchers resolved important issues related to the doses received by the population living near the Techa River where radioactive wastes were released, and they published more than ten articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals. In 2006, researchers published 32 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals. In 2007, researchers published 25 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals, including 6 articles in the September Issue of Health Physics. The entire issue was devoted to the methodology for reconstructing radiation doses in 18,831 Mayak workers first employed between 1948 and 1972.

Contact Information:
Program Manager: Barrett N. Fountos, 301-903-6740

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