Open AccessBayesian methods for interpreting plutonium urinalysis data
Author(s) -
Guthrie Miller,
W.C. Inkret
Publication year - 1995
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Reports
DOI - 10.2172/102159
Subject(s) - plutonium , bayesian probability , urinalysis , principle of maximum entropy , statistics , mathematics , prior probability , posterior probability , distribution (mathematics) , entropy (arrow of time) , urine , chemistry , mathematical analysis , physics , radiochemistry , biochemistry , quantum mechanics
The authors discuss an internal dosimetry problem, where measurements of plutonium in urine are used to calculate radiation doses. The authors have developed an algorithm using the MAXENT method. The method gives reasonable results, however the role of the entropy prior distribution is to effectively fit the urine data using intakes occurring close in time to each measured urine result, which is unrealistic. A better approximation for the actual prior is the log-normal distribution; however, with the log-normal distribution another calculational approach must be used. Instead of calculating the most probable values, they turn to calculating expectation values directly from the posterior probability, which is feasible for a small number of intakes