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canmittee out of the National Bureau of Standards; the United Nations’
Sctentific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR), established
in 1955; the Natfonal Academy of Scfences/National Research Council's
(NAS/NRC) Canmittees on Biological Effects of Atomic Radfation (BEAR), which
first published a report in 1956, and, later, the NAS/NRC's Committee on
Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation (BEIR).
* The Federal Radiation Council (FRC) was formed in 1959 to provide federal
policy on human radiation exposure.
In 1970, this task was transferred to ‘the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which also absorbed fission- and
medical-related matters that had been under the Atomic Energy Canmission and
the Department of Health, Educatton and Welfare. The EPA continues to
functton with the same responsibilities, with interaction with the Nuclear
Regulatory Commisston, the Food and Drug Administration's Bureau of
Radiological Health, and other agencies.
Environmental Radioactivity
At the same time radiobfological research on the effects of internal
emitters was evolving, so, too, was environmental research developing.
Most
research in the 1940s was concerned with the work envirorment where man-made
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or technologically enhanced radioactivity would be encountered in much higher
concentration than in the general environment.
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In 1945, when the Trinity shot occurred, radioactive fallout was first
produced locally (Glasstone et al., 1950).
Fallout continued to be recognized
as a contaminant of the environment thereafter, from testing in the Pacific in
the late 1940s (Carter and Moghissi, 1977; Perkins and Thomas, 1980), hut it
appears thet most concern was about the contamination of meter{al exposed tc
the localized deposition of radioactive dust.
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