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Science: Man and Strontium 90

Strontium 90 is probably the most-feared fission product. Chemically similar to calcium, it is absorbed along with calcium by the human system and deposited in the bones, where its persistent radioactivity (half-life 28 years) may cause cancer. Collecting 500 samples of fresh human bone from widely separated parts of the world, the Columbia men analyzed them delicately and concluded that “at the present time, strontium 90 can be found in all human beings, regardless of age or geographic location s . .” The amount is not large. Averaging all the results together, they reckoned that the human race now has .12 micromicrocuries* of strontium 90 for each gram of body calcium. This is about one ten-thousandth…

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 A fission product with properties close to calcium

Chemically, strontium is close to calcium in the Mendeleev classification. Like calcium, when absorbed, it is preferably fixed in the bone mass. It emits only beta radiation with a short range, which makes it harmful if swallowed or inhaled. In this case, it may be the source of bone cancers and leukaemias if the spinal cord is involved. In food, milk and calcium-rich cheese favour strontium. At sea, strontium will be fixed more on oyster and mussels, crab and shrimp shells, fish bones and scales than in fish flesh. Strontium remains generally at low levels in aquatic organisms. Strontium-90 does not emit gamma rays. Owing to the absence of very characteristic energy rays which would sign its presence, strontium-90 presence is difficult to identify. This absence of gamma rays also means reduced external exposures. One can tread without excessive risks ground contaminated by strontium-90 …

 Can calcium protect you from radioactive strontium?

And it turns out that the U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) has a webpage, on the National Library of Medicine website, under the title “Radiation Emergency Medical Management — Managing Internal Contamination” that recommends calcium carbonate as one treatment for internal contamination with radioactive strontium (and also radium). The calcium competes with strontium for “bone binding sites”. By competitive inhibition, the large amount of calcium in the supplement (calcium carbonate) prevents the uptake of strontium into the bones and teeth.

 Strontium

Because its nucleus is very nearly the same size as that of its "little sister", calcium, the body mistakenly takes up strontium and incorporates it into bones and tooth enamel in the place of calcium. Surprisingly, this is not a health problem and in fact, it can provide a health benefit. However, strontium also has a sinister side, thanks to the ruthless human war machine. The radioactive isotope, 90Sr, is common in radioactive fallout. Since radioactive fallout doesn't respect national borders, it falls upon all living things regardless of nationality or species, contaminating water, food and even the air that we all breathe. This isotope is quite dangerous and can cause a variety of leukæmias, bone cancer and other debilitating bone diseases. Perhaps ironically, Strontium-90 is also used to treat cancer. (Strontium-89, an artificial radioisotope, is used specifically to treat bone cancer.) But the sad fact is that we all are radioactive, some of us moreso than others, as our favourite (radioactive) professor points out in the video embedded below. Radioactive strontium has a half-life of 28.90 years. Thus, everything -- yes, including people -- that was born during that prolonged penis-waving era of nuclear weapons testing is more radioactive than those creatures and plants born before or since. But since then, the Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear reactor accidents have contaminated huge areas with a number of dangerous radioisotopes, including strontium-90. For example, in the aftermath of the Fukushima Daiichi reactor accident, seawater in the area has been found to have 240 times the legal concentration limit of strontium-90, and of course, this is contaminating local marine life, with predictable consequences.

 The Brief Wondrous Life (and Long Dangerous Half-Life) of Strontium-90

While radioactive strontium itself can be linked to several diseases, including leukemia and bone cancers, Sr-90, as mentioned above, is but one of the most measurable of many dangerous isotopes released into the environment by the normal, everyday operation of nuclear reactors, even without the catastrophic discharges that come with accidents and meltdowns. Tritium, along with radioactive variants of iodine, cesium and xenon (to name just a few) can often be detected in elevated levels in areas around nuclear facilities.

Articles of Interest

Strontium: Little Town

Strontian is a modest little town in the Scottish Highlands. It has a population around 400, and didn’t even have a high school until 2002. And it is, of course, the namesake for element 38 on the periodic table — an honor that can be claimed by no place else in the United Kingdom. It was founded as a mining town in the early 18th century. Lead was their main product, especially lead for bullets. The mines at Strontian produced nearly all of the bullets fired in the Napoleonic Wars, and captured French soldiers would then be made to work in those mines.

Baby Tooth Science

Although Sr-90 was just one of the 100-plus chemicals in fallout, it quickly became the favorite for in-body testing, as its half life of 28.7 years makes it detectable for a long period after a bone or tooth is extracted from the body. But Sr-90 was also recognized as one of the most harmful components of the clouds. It was known to penetrate into the bone marrow, where red and white blood cells crucial to the immune response are formed.

Calcium, Strontium, and Fallout

Dr. Chusid's concern (Pediatrics, 29:850) over radioactive fallout, and particularly strontium-90 levels, in milk from nuclear bomb testing, is unfortunately shared by many persons, mainly from newspaper accounts. There is an erroneous impression that milk contains more fallout than other foods. This misapprehension is due to the fact that milk is used for surveying strontium-90 levels because samples are easily obtained at all seasons, and because milk is rich in calcium. The strontium-90 from fallout accompanies calcium as the calcium is absorbed from soil by plants.

Citizen Science By The Skin Of Your Teeth

By 1961, the team published results showing that strontium-90 levels in the teeth increased depending on when the child was born. Children born in 1963 had levels of strontium-90 fifty times higher than those born in 1950, when there was very little nuclear testing.

Focus on Blocking Strontium

The Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) and the United States Department of Energy (USDOE) have explored many technologies to address strontium-90 in the soil and groundwater to prevent its migration to the Columbia River. The use of apatite is one of the newer technologies Ecology proposed to remediate groundwater contaminated with strontium-90. Apatite chemically attracts strontium. In 2004 and 2005, scientists at Hanford looked at using apatite to isolate or capture the strontium in the soil

Radionuclide Basics: Strontium-90

Strontium (chemical symbol Sr) is a silvery metal that rapidly turns yellowish in air. Naturally occurring strontium is not radioactive. The most common man-made radioactive form of strontium is strontium-90 (Sr-90). Strontium-90 is produced commercially through nuclear fission for use in medicine and industry. It also is found in the environment from nuclear testing that occurred in the 1950s and 1960s as well in nuclear reactor waste.

Revisiting the Historic Strontium-90 Ingestion Beagle Study

Strontium-90 is a radionuclide found in high concentrations in nuclear reactor waste and nuclear fallout from reactor accidents and atomic bomb explosions. In the 1950s, little was known regarding the health consequences of strontium-90 internalization. To assess the health effects of strontium-90 ingestion in infancy through adolescence, the Atomic Energy Commission and Department of Energy funded large-scale beagle studies at the University of California Davis. Conducted from 1956 to 1989, the strontium-90 ingestion study followed roughly 460 beagles throughout their lifespans after they were exposed to strontium-90 in utero (through feeding of the mother) and fed strontium-90 feed at varying doses from weaning to age 540 days

Sr-90

Strontium-90 (Sr-90) is a radioactive isotope of strontium with a half-life of approximately 28.8 years. It is a byproduct of nuclear fission in reactors and during nuclear weapon explosions. Sr-90 undergoes beta decay, emitting high-energy beta particles as it transforms into yttrium-90, which also emits beta radiation. This isotope is considered hazardous due to its chemical similarity to calcium, allowing it to integrate into bones and teeth when ingested, posing health risks.

Strontium-90 activity concentration in soil samples from the exclusion zone of the Fukushima daiichi nuclear power plant

The radioactive fission product 90Sr has a long biological half-life (˜18 y) in the human body. Due to its chemical similarity to calcium it accumulates in bones and irradiates the bone marrow, causing its high radio-toxicity. Assessing 90Sr is therefore extremely important in case of a nuclear disaster.

Strontium: bone drug or nutrient?

Elemental strontium is a natural part of the earth’s crust and is very different from “strontium 90” which is a hazardous radioactive nuclear fallout product from aboveground nuclear testing. All strontium used in bone-building health products is elemental strontium

Strontium: Science-Based Facts vs Fiction

You may also have heard of strontium-90, a radioactive isotope that is one of the most dangerous isotopes present in the radioactive fallout of a nuclear reaction. Part of the reason why this particular radioactive particle is especially hazardous, is because the body treats strontium almost exactly like it treats calcium.

THE ATOM: The Peril of Strontium 90

Libby did not deny that there was risk in the tests; for example, “excessive dosages” of strontium 90 can cause bone cancer and leukemia in animals, “so we should not casually dismiss the possibility of harmful results from fallout.” But the risk appears to be remote. Reason: there is no present evidence that people living at high altitudes or on land with heavy uranium deposits are more susceptible to these diseases than anyone else. In sum, the risk to man from H-bomb testing “is extremely small compared with risks which persons everywhere take as a normal part of their lives.”

The Fascinating World of Strontium: From Discovery to Modern Supplements

The story of strontium begins in the small Scottish village of Strontian, where in 1790, Adair Crawford, a Scottish chemist, identified a new mineral as strontianite. This marked the discovery of strontium, which was later isolated in its metallic form by Humphry Davy in 1808 through electrolysis. The early uses of strontium were predominantly in the production of sugar from sugar beet and in pyrotechnics, where it's responsible for the brilliant reds in fireworks.

What Caused My Cancer? Radioactive Isotope in Baby Teeth May Be a Clue

For Carolyn and many others living in the St. Louis area, whose family members had cancer in the 1970s and in subsequent decades, it wasn’t until recently that they learned of a possible cause of those deadly illnesses. An article published last March in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported on the revival of a famous study that measured radioactive fallout from aboveground atom bomb tests and its absorption in human

Resources

CDC

Sr-90 is produced commercially through nuclear fission for use in medicine and industry. It also is found in the environment from nuclear testing that occurred in the 1950s and 1960s. It can be found in nuclear reactor waste and can contaminate reactor parts and fluids.

Chemistry Learner

It is a by-product of the fission reaction of Plutonium and Uranium in a nuclear reactor or in nuclear weapons. It may pollute the parts and fluids of a reactor.