ee eee eee

This laboratory, working in conjunction with the Beltsville gro
order to further explore this possibility, the soils from five
were analyzed for radium, as were the bones of the livestock,
obtained are plotted in Figure 10. Radium determinations could|Jnot be
completed on the Tifton samples because these arrived too late
build up of daughter product activity following separation of +}
228. The four ratios obtained when plotted against reciprocal
calcium do not show as clear a linear regression as was true fo strontium.
This may be due to the fact that radium does not behave as stro ium does,
or to analytical difficulty with the low radium concentrations
soile
The results are not completely discouraging and further work se
jndicated,
Comparison of Radiostrontium in Various
Biological Materials

Among the various materials which have been analyzed for radiost

are soma which have in common the fact that the isotopes origina
large extent from soils in the region of southern New York and n
New Jersey, These samples include the lambs and calves from pas
Ithaca and Rutgers, the New York City milk supply, human milk an
borns from the metropolitan New York area, For the last two kin
samples, the primary origin of the radiostrontiwm is, of course, in doubt
but in human milk and stillborn alike there is likely to be a la fe con=
tribution of calcium, and therefore strontium which has its ori
in the
soils from this area,
Table 10 summarizes the results of analysis of these mterials.

[It will

be noted that the Sr°9799 activity when expressed in d/min/gm of fFalcium
are of the same order,

This is again a test of the constancy of the calciumsradiostrontibm ratio

in caloium obtained from various places in the biological feeding chain.

These samples have in common the faot that in one way or another he

caloium was derived via vegetation, the calciwmsradiostrontium ragkio of
which was determined by the cumulative fallout in the geographical area
and the exchangeable calciwn of the soil. A more liberal samplink program and a more careful study of the dietary habits of humans in fhe
area studied seem indicated,

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