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Feasibility of noninvasive analysis of lead in the human tibia by soft x‐ray fluorescence
Author(s) -
Wielopolski L.,
Rosen J. F.,
Slatkin D. N.,
Vartsky D.,
Ellis K. J.,
Cohn S. H.
Publication year - 1983
Publication title -
medical physics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.473
H-Index - 180
eISSN - 2473-4209
pISSN - 0094-2405
DOI - 10.1118/1.595244
Subject(s) - tibia , nuclear medicine , lead (geology) , absorption (acoustics) , soft tissue , materials science , fluorescence , chemistry , radiochemistry , nuclear magnetic resonance , analytical chemistry (journal) , medicine , pathology , anatomy , optics , physics , geology , chromatography , geomorphology , composite material
A postmortem study was conducted to assess the feasibility of measuring bone lead concentrations noninvasively in vivo . Characteristic L x rays were induced with an external source of 1 2 5 I in the superficial tibial cortex of the intact legs of six adults who had no history of occupational exposure to lead. Tibial lead concentrations in the same bones subsequently determined by flameless atomic absorption spectroscopy varied from 15 to 35 μg Pb/g wet weight. The upper limit for the modern normal range of lead in the bone is about 25 mg Pb/g wet tissue. The linear correlation coefficient ( r ) between the measurements made with x‐ray fluorescence and lead concentration by absorption spectroscopy was 0.90. Radiation doses of 10 mGy (1 rad) to 1 cm 2 of skin, with associated doses to the marrow of adjacent bone of about 0.6 mGy (60 mrad), yielded net lead fluorescence signals ranging from one to seven times the standard deviation of background.