SESSION IV

215

DONALDSON: They don't make mistakes!
smart as those fish.

I wish I had students as

WARREN: I think that this point which Lauren nas found is of great
significance in this whole story of radiation exposure and yet it's been

sort of ignored.

.

FREMONT-SMITH: It's against the dogma.
It's submerged, it's suppressed.

And not just ignored,

WARREN: I've examined this with great interest for years since
he fir. had this finding.

DONALDSON:

Let's get the record straight.

I'm still under...

WARKEN: He's still exploring.
DONALDSON: . . .under the initial directive that I received from
Dr. Warren back in 1943, during the days of tne Manhattan Engineer~
ing Project. The experiment must be carried out over many years

and it must be done in the complete environment, not just in the laboratory.

In other words, the fish must be exposed during the time

that they would be, say, living in the effluent of the Hanford Works,

and we must be able to get our hands on them again when they return
from the sea in order to evaluate the effects, if any, from their exposure to radiation. In other words, we must not simply say, because

they didn't die in the first 90 days or 20 days or the first year, that

there was no effect. I naively told Dr. Warren, let's see, 24 years
ago, that yes, we could do this experiment. I didn't realize that it
weuld take me 24 years to get the facilities and develop a salmon run
that would return to the University campus. Each exposure level
takes a minimum of five years to evaluate
FREMONT-SMITH:

You're going to telephone tomorrow afternoon

and tell us what the answer is?

DONALDSON: One step toward the answer.
WARREN:

[think this is very significant and I think a great deal

of credit is owed to the AEC Division of Medicine and Biology for
continuing to support this work over the years, 20-odd years, with
such a small yield in return for a few percentage of fish. This has
been maintained over the years and you're now in what, 26 generations?

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