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Seems I missed a bad edit in an earlier revert. Marked for split-off anyway, I'm not going to re-include the section, but please also consider this content on the health effects of environmental radon. Femto 13:34, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
Is it really true that there is no evidence behind healhyness of radon spas? I think that the mechanism is somehow also known as activation of DNA repair mechanisms and maybe further immunisation.
Here http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10952746&dopt=Abstract is a study comparing carbon dioxide and radon spas versus artificial carbon dioxide baths alone in patients with rheumatoid arthritis, "CONCLUSION: Marked short-term improvements in both groups at the end of treatment may have masked potential specific therapeutic effects of radon baths. However, after 6 months of follow-up the effects were lasting only in patients of the radon arm. This suggests that this component of the rehabilitative intervention can induce beneficial long-term effects."
regards, tygr007
There seem to be two chapters, with duplicate content, regarding the spas. It is explained in both Applications and Radon therapy sections. Perhaps they should be merged somehow. -- Bisqwit 10:43, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Uh guys, I think I screwed up when adding that part about removing tumors. Could someone please verify it? Starhood` 21:53, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Can you people please use the {{ Cite web}} template for the references? It will look neater. 74.116.113.241 21:38, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
The Marshalls hat a closer look at the original articles from Drn and Rutherford on the Radium emanation, and they conclude that Dorn only did the same experiments already done by Rutherford in 1900 (citing his article on the gas from thorium) without claiming the gas being a new element. The Book of Rutherford from 1906 is the first source for the phrase: radium emanation and the doing further rearch gaining the insight that the emanation of thorium and that of radium are gases are different, but both from the newly discovered group of noble gases. The credit for molar mass and spectrum should go to Ramsay and Gray like it is done in most papers.
There was radium in toothpaste, not radon! -- Vlad Jaroslavleff 18:24, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
Which of the Lindgren publications is the one used!
Over Underground Coal Mines, presented at the 1989 Annual GSA meeting in St. Louis, MO. -- Stone ( talk) 17:54, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
So you might notice redundant&akward information appearing in several places. I plan to trim it down in the future, but if anybody wants to help he/she is welcome to. Nergaal ( talk) 03:52, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
I will use this references later on. Pls don't delete them. Nergaal ( talk) 13:35, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Nergaal ( talk) 04:59, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
- * ATSDR - Case Studies in Environmental Medicine: Radon Toxicity U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (public domain) - * [2] - * UK site with Radon information and risk reports for UK addresses - * Iowa Radon Lung Cancer Study - * Minnesota radon project - * Los Alamos National Laboratory - Radon - * USGS Periodic Table - Radon - * EPA Iowa Radon Study - * World Health Organization International Radon Project - * Radon Occurrence and Health Risks - * WebElements.com - Radon - * U.S. Environmental Protection Agency — Indoor Air Radon - * Ask TreeHugger: What Do Radon Tests Mean? - * Radon Removal - * Radon Occurrence and Health Risk - * Eastern Regional Radon Training Center - * "Present status of national standards". NIST.
A methodical ten year long case controlled study by Thompson et al. (2008) [3] of residential Radon exposure in Worcester County, Massachusetts (that included carefully placing dose monitors for one year in areas of homes where subjects spent most time) found an apparent 60% reduction in lung cancer risk amongst people exposed to low levels (0-150 Bq/m3; typically encountered in 90% of American homes) of Radon gas. [4]. This study indicates that the LNT is flawed and that there maybe a hormetic effect at low exposure levels. -- Diamonddavej ( talk) 17:09, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
I am trying to understand what is meant by the statement that Radon is "heavy" -- does this mean that a container filled with the gas would be noticably heavier? Is Radon so dense as a gas that a solid (like a piece of wood) would actually float in it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jrm2007 ( talk • contribs) 09:34, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
"Radon, along with other noble gases krypton and xenon, is also produced during the operation of nuclear power plants. A small fraction of it leaks out of the fuel, through the cladding and into the cooling water, from which it is scavenged. It is then routed to a holding tank where it remains for a large number of half-lives. It is finally purged to the open air through a tall stack which is carefully monitored for radiation level."
I don't believe this is true - Radon has too high an atomic number for it to be a product of nuclear fission.
Can someone please provide a citation? If not, I think it should be removed. 59.167.76.11 12:02, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
In the above paragraph, and in other sources which I have read, it states that Radon is the product of the radioactive decay of Uranium, the main article state is is from the radioactive decay of Radium, is it both? Clarification please. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.193.204.68 ( talk) 20:21, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
Peterson, K. A.; Figgen, D.; Goll, E.; Stoll, H.; Dolg, M. J. Chem. Phys. 2003, 119, 11113-11123. Nergaal ( talk) 00:28, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
I would have submitted this article for GAN several months ago, but I waited for someone to wikify and trim down the Hazards section. I went in detail through all the aspects of the article except that one which I found quite repetitive. I am happy that someone else is interested in the article, but pls, try to go through that section and check for repetitivness too (I find it mega boring so I can't make myself do it :| ).
Also, in the future, for any article under the scope of wikipedia:Elements, please list them on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Elements page in the announcement tab. This will attract more reviewers ;). Thanks a lot! Nergaal ( talk) 19:12, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
This review is transcluded from Talk:Radon/GA2. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review. GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria
This article is in decent shape, but it needs more work before it becomes a Good Article.
-- ThinkBlue (Hit BLUE) 22:36, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
In the last revision I edited, I found duplicate named references, i.e. references sharing the same name, but not having the same content. Please check them, as I am not able to fix them automatically :)
DumZiBoT ( talk) 05:09, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
In Italy, after the last earthquake that happened in Abruzzo, Radon caused an discussion between Giampaolo Giuliani and a lot of scientist because his presunted relatioship with earthquake. (in fact, Giampaolo Giuliani made an prevision based on Radon concentration, but the prevision was wrong in date and place, respectively 2 weeks before the accident and 120km near) -- 87.9.254.197 ( talk) 14:55, 4 May 2009 (UTC) (Marcopete87)
The Association_of_American_Physicians_and_Surgeons's journal, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. Unfortunately, this is a quack journal (according to Quackwatch) and should not be included. PDBailey ( talk) 18:32, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
The LNT concept can be a useful pragmatic tool for assessing rules in radioprotection for doses above 10 mSv; however since it is not based on biological concepts of our current knowledge, it should not be used without precaution for assessing by extrapolation the risks associated with low and even more so, with very low doses (< 10 mSv)[.]
Until the [...] uncertainties on low-dose response are resolved, the Committee believes that an increase in the risk of tumour induction proportionate to the radiation dose is consistent with developing knowledge and that it remains, accordingly, the most scientifically defensible approximation of low-dose response. However, a strictly linear dose response should not be expected in all circumstances.
However, problems and possible artifacts of the assay system employed are also discussed. When radioresistance is observed after doses that cause some cell lethality—for example, after chronic doses that continually eliminate cells from the population—the radioresistance that emerges may be caused either (1) by some inductive phenomenon or (2) by selecting for cells that are intrinsically radioresistant. Either process 1 or process 2 could occur as the radiosensitive cells are selectively killed and thus eliminated from the population as the chronic irradiation is delivered. In the end, an adaptive or hormetic response in the population may appear to have occurred, but this would be at the expense of eliminating the sensitive or weak components in the population
Biem, I am not really sure what to say. There is a published work refuting Cohens work, it is well accepted. I have you several additional mechanisms by which one could get such a false result. Cohen's paper fails to test LNT, end of story. It is therefore uninteresting and not germane this article. PDBailey ( talk) 23:40, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
Hello, PDBailey, I've tried to restructure the section "Health incidence of radon exposition", and I read the articles that made a case-control study on radon effects: actually, most of them seem to detect trends, but nothing much convincing as far as hard fact is concerned. I reformulated accordingly and completed the " Epidemiology studies" section. I seize the opportunity to re-read the article and tidy it a bit. Feel free to edit whatever you want to correc (with due respect to Wikipedian principles, of course). Sincerely, Biem ( talk) 20:23, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
No reference is given, no hit on the net, and there is no way radon can be produced in nuclear reactors in significant quantities : it is too heavy to be a significant fission product, and too heavy to be an activation product. Where does this "info" comes from? Biem ( talk) 06:21, 7 May 2009 (UTC)
NFPA 704 safety square | |
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The "health=4" seemed incorrect : exposure to radon does not cause death as hydrogen cyanide would. I changed it to "health=0" in the article, but is there reference data for that ? Biem ( talk) 06:07, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
This section is a bit of a beast and, to me, appears best fitted for a radiation dose response page rather than this page. PDBailey ( talk) 12:54, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
I'd actually say that there is a fair amount on this page that regards epidemiology and statistics and appears to regard environmental carcinogens with special attention to radiation more than radon. PDBailey ( talk) 18:28, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
The following statement was referenced with Darby et al.
There is great uncertainty in applying risk estimates derived from studies in miners to the effects of residential radon, and direct estimates of the risks of residential radon are needed.
I think this is a fair assessment of the article's second paragraph in the Introduction. However, the paper is titled, "Radon in homes and risk of lung cancer: collaborative analysis of individual data from 13 European case-control studies." And so, before the article was written Darby, et al. argue that there needs to be more work on home radon doses. However, the conclusion does not appear so guarded. In fact, they appear to think their paper provided a reasonable answer
We have shwon that residential radon produces substantial hazards, particularly among smokers, even at concentrations below the action levels currently recommended in many countries of a few hndred Bq/m3
Because of this, I have changed the text to read,
While there are studies showing no threshold for response to radon as low as 100 Bq m-3 (2.7 pCi/L), lower doses have not been explored.
I think this is reasonably guarded and at least agrees with the substantial gist of the article cited. PDBailey ( talk) 23:40, 28 June 2009 (UTC)
Pdbailey, Wikipedia:No original research clearly forbids you to draw your own conclusions like in this modification, and especially not by misquoting references.
Actually, if you look seriously at the results of this pooled study, given here [30], you will see (figure 1, p. 141) that no effect is observed at 20 Bq/m3, and that the error bars all cross the "no-effect" axis until the very last (at 350 Bq/m3). Is that the proof you are speaking of? Furthermore, these are but case-control studies, and everybody knows how error-prone these are...
Please stop this POV-pushing about would-be "conclusive" radon effects at low exposures, this is tiresome. Thanks in advance. Biem ( talk) 20:21, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
The Darby article is given here. Read it seriously, with a critical eye. Look at table 3 : nearly all studies are compatible with "no effect" in the 95%CI, and the pooled results barely make a 1.01 above the 1.00 "no effect". Have a look at figure 4 : all the data shown are inconclusive...
The other Darby article collaborative analysis of individual data from 13 European case-control studies pretends that the data is compatible with a linear relationship? sure enough, but it would be compatible with any other kind of relationship, it hasn't proven anything. Have a close look at figure 1, you will see that the data actually falls into three groups : in the 0-100 Bq/m3 no effect is detected ; in the 100-400 Bq/m3 the relative risk is around 0.5 ; and at 700 Bq/m3 it climbs at 2. Doesn't that suggest a threshold to you, especially when radiobiological studies have concluded that the effect cannot be linear? The linear model does not fit very properly in the first place, then "Models with no effect up to a “threshold” dose and then a linear effect did not fit significantly better", sure enough, but both the data and the radiobiology suggest a threshold and a plateau effect, which was not tested - quacks, really, that ignore facts and relevant studies from other fields.
And remember, these are case-control studies, where the real effect can be widely outside the error bars. How conclusive does that seem? Your user page states you are a mathematician and a statistician, you should know better than that.
The papers may have been published in a review, but is still very polemical and disputable. Actually, the French Academy of Sciences 2005 report was (explicitly) written in response to another article by the same author (Berrington dG, Darby S. Risk of cancer from diagnostic X-rays: estimates for the UK and 14 other countries. Lancet 2004;363:345-51.), precisely to denounce it as a quack, because enough is enough (this LNT lobbying has been denounced as the biggest fraud in modern science, in other publications)... A national academy of sciences, against a polemical searcher? Open your eyes, now, its's the same author and the same method - an activist with unreliable results twisted to gain some fuzz around his name. Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools...
If your only aim is to quote that article because "NPOV requires that this not be suppressed", then be happy, it was already quoted. But with such an argument, why do you insist on suppressing the Thomson article, which "showed substantial cancer rate reduction between 50 and 123 Bq per cubic meter relative to a group at zero to 25 Bq per cubic meter" - just because it does not fit your views ?
Be honest and stop that now. Biem ( talk) 07:00, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
The debate about the effect of low level exposures to radiation goes right back to 1900. Pierre Curie's father was a homeopathic doctor and the theoretical model for the original use of radiation from radon and radium in curietherapie was that a small dose of something that is fatal in large doses might be therapeutic. (Pierre experimented on small rodents). Still in the 1980s there were physicists with radiodermatitis on their hands who thought that their low exposure to radiation might have had a therapeutic effect.
I wanted to post a warning that I fear there is confusion underlying the paragraph on Radon in Radiography. That paragraph has no reference given, when I reseached my PhD on the history of the radiotherapy of cancer I came across no reference to it.
It is undoubtedly the case that in many countries radon gas was generated from radium salts in solution, stored in glass or gold 'beads' and used in the treatment of cancer, both surgically implated and placed in a mould on the skin in a way intended to focus radiation on the lesion. The sourcing for that is there in the article and could be massively extended. There is however no reference for radon in radiography in the modern meaning of generating images using (non-light) radiation. Before the first World War when anti-German feeling meant that Roentgenology changed its name to radiology curiethapie was used to describe the use of radon and radium therapy of cancer, lupus, TB of the skin etc.
Of course, people also tried inhalation therapies as well and the drinking of radon solution for the treatment of arthritis. All of the first 4 technicians at the London Radium CLinic where such treatments were given died as a result of changes to their blood cells. In Manchester, Rutherford (before he moved to Cambridge), had to clean up the spilt radium solution that was being used for the generation of radon beads. Soddy, before he worked with Rutherford was also involved in the production of Radon beads.
It is worrying to read on this site that radon solution therapies are being offered again. Polonium killed Litvinenko and is a breakdown product of radon. The history of spillages , explosions and losses in these therapies is quite worrying, in Britain legislation exists to control who can offer radioactive tretments, are patients in the USA not offered similar protections?. Carolinerutter ( talk) 13:13, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
I belive that we are getting closer to making this article FA material. If you find things that need to be done, please create a list that details what you think should be done. Thanks! Wii Wiki ( talk) 21:00, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
This article is quite long, and several sections seem to be candidates for a new article (or new articles). In particular, the sections entitled "Health incidence of radon exposition", "Studies on domestic exposures", and "Health policy on radon public exposure" seem too in-depth for a general coverage of radon; they should be summarized, and the details moved to another article (or other articles) specifically addressing these issues.— Tetracube ( talk) 18:54, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
If someone knows about measurement, and is logged in... please you should change the melting point to: Melting point 202.0 K
Why isn't there an article discussing the use of "radon water", a form of quack medicine from the early 20th century? Beyond this use, radon was also used to "heal" wounds in hospitals, long before anyone knew of radiation poisoning or cancer. It was applied to bandages to "speed the healing process" ... this had great short term results (faster tissue healing), but it caused cancer pretty soon after. In fact, doctors initially considered radon to be somewhat of a panacea due to its "healing" effects. It was around forty years later that the dangers of ionizing radiation were finally appreciated. And yet none of this is discussed anywhere! Fuzzform ( talk) 08:41, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
The lead states that radon is odorless. This may be a picky point, but I very much doubt anyone has ever taken a breath of pure radon to find what it smells like. (And if they have, they probably didn't live long enough to describe their experience.) So it doesn't seem to me that the article should say anything about the odor. Of course, what it probably means is that radon is odorless at any concentration you are likely to encounter; maybe the wording could be changed to reflect that. Kevin Nelson ( talk) 15:13, 6 June 2010 (UTC)
As the author of a PhD thesis on the history of the Radiotherapy of Cancer (University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technolgy 1985? it was a lon time ago). I am concerned about the un-referenced paragraph on the use of Radon in radiography. In the early years of the twentieth century the word radiography did not really exist. In the years before the anti german feeling generated by the first world war Roentgenography was commonly used. Radiotherapy was at that time called curietherapie in an analogous manner.
I never came across any reference to the use of radon in the production of medical images: it was undoubtedly used in the glass and gold seeds reffered to in the paragraph headed radiotherapy. Since there is no reference to any source given in the paragraph headed 'radiography' I suggest that the paragraph be deleted until some reliable source is found. It is likely that there may have been an error at some point in the reading/writing/translation/interpretation of the the term 'radiography' which now means exclusively the generation of images using radiation.
If I am wrong and there is a reference - let's include it. Thanks Caroline Rutter
An IP user has attempted to add a sentence like "The actual number of how high these radon levels were measured at is not known." several times. This still seems like a contentious claim. Somebody did measure how high the radon levels were, how can it not be known? Is there a reliable source that says these levels are definitely not known? Please help me understand what the intent is here. Thanks. Zad68 ( talk) 20:03, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
68.188.203.251 ( talk) 02:40, 5 September 2012 (UTC)
Please explain how this radon glow from condensation would present itself. Example: would a p trap in a shower drain with only a strainer cover in a small apartment in a high rise senior subsidized tower ever glow blue due to condensed daughter particles from radon gas? Would this glow be the emission of alpha particles? Would a glow sufficient to be seen at night without light be significant? If this glow is seen 4 nights out of 7 for hours at a time be of concern? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.188.203.251 ( talk) 02:07, 5 September 2012 (UTC)
207.75.81.12 ( talk) 17:14, 19 October 2012 (UTC) Underestimated amounts of radon off gasses from tree transpiration. Article: http://www.radonleaders.org/sites/default/files/Role%20of%20Vegetation%20in%20Enhancing%20Radon%20Concentration%20and%20Ion%20Production%20in%20the%20Atmosphere.pdf Was not able to find original research on wether or not our human history is an adaptation to significant radon exposure.
I don't know whether it's been confirmed that radon is tasteless. Anyone who inhaled it either would not be able to discern it at all if the quantity is too small or be killed from the alpha radiation. Jasper Deng (talk) 05:56, 9 February 2012 (UTC)
In the concentration scale section, the third section of the table says:
In the next section of the table it says:
The first suggests that above 4 pCi/L there is a potential problem, while the second says that the home owner "should consider" remediation above 20 pCi/L. It's a long way from 4 to 20 -- where should the line actually be drawn? . . Jim - Jameslwoodward ( talk to me • contribs) 14:27, 6 March 2013 (UTC)
This picture is odd enough that this may be WP:OR, or at least needs a citation. It is described on Wikimedia as "a system for (supposedly) diluting Radon into drinking water," but I'm not convinced that's even right. The French translation matches; I can't confirm the Japanese, but I have a suspicion that the intent might be to reduce radon concentration. Could "dilution" could have been misunderstood in translation? Surely it would not be legal to add radon to water in Japan? From examination, it's conceivable that the stainless vessel in the corner could contain some radium-bearing gravel, and the need for radiation shielding might explain why it looks heftier than your typical drinking water component. The other two containers could be filters to prevent pure radium from getting through. But this could also just be an ordinary home-made 3-stage filtration system that would remove radon's parent and daughter elements naturally found in groundwater. There is no bubbler that could really remove radon, but letting the water rest in that glass jar at the end would help evaporate it out.-- Yannick ( talk) 18:53, 1 December 2012 (UTC)
My opinion is that this greenish photograph should be removed. It is not a photo of radon, but a photo of some kind of needle presumably filled with radon which induces radioluminescence of the phosphor layer on which the needle is resting. Radon is a colourless gas, and if no one manages to find a photograph of actual radon in liquid and/or solid state which glows on its own, it's better not to have any photo at all to avoid confusion. Endimion17 ( talk) 14:04, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
You raise some of the same questions that occurred to me immediately. An attention-getting picture, but not necessarily what it is claimed to be. Hopefully something better will turn up. Also, I agree that the Rutherford spectrum image is of historical interest, and is well-placed in the article. Reify-tech ( talk) 14:34, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
Also, R8R Gtrs has gently admonished me to not use the diacritics. Remedied! Double sharp ( talk) 02:37, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
The history and etymology section of this article says that radon was discovered in 1900. But the box at the beginning says 1898. Is it just rounded, or altogether incorrect? -- (T) Numbermaniac (C) 08:50, 7 June 2013 (UTC)
This article contains a lot of unaddressed citation needed tags (most of them years old), thus failing criterion 1b, which requires citations for statistics and challenged material. I will wait a week before closing this reassessment so editors can have the opportunity to fix these issues.-- FutureTrillionaire ( talk) 01:05, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
@ DMacks: Hold on, the article contains at least 5 one-sentence paragraphs (mostly in the Application and Health risks sections). MOS:PARAGRAPHS (which is part of MOS:LAYOUT, whose guidelines need to be met to satisfy criterion 1b) says: "The number of single-sentence paragraphs should be minimized." -- FutureTrillionaire ( talk) 13:55, 24 July 2013 (UTC)
Result: Kept.-- FutureTrillionaire ( talk) 22:27, 24 July 2013 (UTC)
This figure is taken from reference 1 (Toxological profile for radon), but is probably erroneous : living at 100 kBq/m3 would lead to 8 Sv/year, and no WHO official in its right mind would ever recommend that level! I suppose the "kBq" should be "Bq", more in line with the 10 mSv/year limit. Can somebody check that figure? Thanks in advance. Biem ( talk) 07:19, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
...and 100 Bq/l=100 kBq/m³ of course ; but that's for drinking water, not breathing air. Biem ( talk) 18:46, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
I'd say, no. The problem with these analysis is that which is described in the section radon#Epidemiology studies of domestic expositions : First of all, these are but case-control studies (or ecological studies), which are a priori prone to numerous bias - so they shouldn't be taken too literally (just indications that there might perhaps be something like that...). Secondly, all these studies suffer the same problem at low doses: in these areas, the effect is vanishing (predicted and observed), and the data becomes inconclusive. The error bars are compatible with a linear effect, or with a threshold effect, or with any kind of bizarre dose-effect law, simply because the error bars are much too large for anything to be said conclusively. In this context of epidemiological approaches, to say that "The XYZ study has obtained results compatible with a linear law, and no threshold has been observed" is a truism - it would be true of any study, whatever the real dose-effect law is. You may add any number of studies that say so, and add any number of people that believe that the LNT holds, this will not amount to a scientific proof.
On the other hand, see the section radon#Dose-effect model retained : "In the radiobiology and carcinogenesis studies, progress has been made in understanding the first steps of cancer development, but not to the point of validating a reference dose-effect model. The only certainty gained is that the process is very complex, the resulting dose-effect response being complex, and most probably not a linear one." That is hard fact, it is scientifically known that the LNT cannot be correct - but nobody knows what the correct model is.
But given that, saying that so-and-so believes that the LNT may be true is just that - a belief. You may say that a lot of people think that way, it is still a belief. Add a thousand references, it won't turn it into a factual knowledge about reality, just knowledge about what people think? so what?... An encyclopedia deals with knowledge. The knowledge that can be stated has been stated above : "the process is very complex, the resulting dose-effect response being complex, and most probably not a linear one" - and that's that...
Regards, Biem ( talk) 17:08, 27 June 2009 (UTC)
Apologies if I'm posting in the wrong pace here but I've spotted a really major issue out there on the web- there seems to be some confusion between Bequerels per metre cubed (Bq m3), which is claimed by the main article to be the standard measure or radon activity by volume of air, and Bequerels per metre TO THE POWER OF MINUS 3 (Bq m–3), or per Litre, which makes a difference of a thousand- fold! The document below uses the latter units: http://www.hpa.org.uk/webc/HPAwebFile/HPAweb_C/1243838496865 . — Preceding unsigned comment added by Elementperson ( talk • contribs) 18:31, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
Lung cancer from smoking tobacco products is higher from US tobacco products that from investigations of lung cancer vs smoking in other countries with higher per capita cigarette consumption e.g. mainland China. (This has been attributed to fertilization of US Tobacco crops from phosphate mines that once were mined for Thorium. Also note: "An additive rather than a multiplicative model has been gaining support to illustrate the connection between smoking and radon daughter induced lung cancer" [Harely N et al; Environmental Health Perspectives]. Shjacks45 ( talk) 08:56, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
(2011) Journal of Environmental Radioactivity, 102 (10), pp. 901-905 Shjacks45 ( talk) 09:22, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
Radon is the heaviest known gas, nine times heavier than air.
-radonseal.com/radon-indoor.htm
Lighter than air, it rises through cracks and fissures in the ground and can enter a home through cracks, joints and openings in a concrete slab, or move easily through floor, wall and ceiling framing assemblies.
-ezriderhomeinspections.blogspot.com/2008/07/little-information-about-radon.html
Radon is the heaviest of all gases.
-free-radon-test-kits.com/radon-gas.htm (guess these guys know for a fact that its the heavyest gass since chuck norris and any other gass we might discover in the future)
RADON GAS IS PRODUCED FROM THE NATURAL BREAKDOWN OF URANIUM IN SOIL , ROCK AND WATER, IT IS LIGHTER THAN AIR AND MOVES UP INTO THE HOME THROUGH CRACKS AND HOLES IN THE FOUNDATION
-thishomeinspector.com/Radon
I could go on, if you do a search trough google and read the different articles on radon, including the wiki one, one gets realy confused over if its heavyer or lighter than air?(hot cold indoor outdoor or in open space, below ground and so on).
It get sucked in from vacum then supposedly it floats upwards because its lighter and thus travels into ventilation in roof?... Yet its heavyer than air in some articles likes to say it fills the basement pref trough cracks. then some articles says cold basements force the radon out, yet warm basements whit some fire based heaters sucks it inn, yet electric heaters just pushes it down (so the radon is realy close to the floor so getting that into your lungs i suppose would be hard unless you crawl on the floor i suppose?.
Confusion mess§ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.8.130.17 ( talk) 07:22, 11 October 2010 (UTC)
Is radon really the heaviest gase at the room temperature? Some people say that the heaviest gase at the temperature of room is not radon, but uranium hexafluoride. Radon has molar mass of 222 g/mol and UF6 has 352.02 g/mol. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.149.96.128 ( talk) 20:34, 7 March 2014 (UTC)
Melting point 64.052 °C (triple point at 151 kPa[1]) Boiling point 56.5 °C (sublimes)
Thank you, D'Macks! Yes, I've read that the compound UF6 has melting point at 64 and it boils at 56 degrees. But can it be a gaseous substance at 18° if we reduce the pressure?.. About PuF6 – it is completely new for me. Thanks for info. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.149.96.128 ( talk) 14:38, 22 March 2014 (UTC)
Wouldn't it be more accurate to say "second greatest contributing factor to..." or similar, given that cancer doesn't have a "cause" per se, but rather a chance of happening that's increased by exposure to risk factors (radiation, carcinogenic chemicals etc.). A bit anal, yes, but it makes the article less misleading in my opinion. 78.151.181.86 ( talk) 20:57, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
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Seems I missed a bad edit in an earlier revert. Marked for split-off anyway, I'm not going to re-include the section, but please also consider this content on the health effects of environmental radon. Femto 13:34, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
Is it really true that there is no evidence behind healhyness of radon spas? I think that the mechanism is somehow also known as activation of DNA repair mechanisms and maybe further immunisation.
Here http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10952746&dopt=Abstract is a study comparing carbon dioxide and radon spas versus artificial carbon dioxide baths alone in patients with rheumatoid arthritis, "CONCLUSION: Marked short-term improvements in both groups at the end of treatment may have masked potential specific therapeutic effects of radon baths. However, after 6 months of follow-up the effects were lasting only in patients of the radon arm. This suggests that this component of the rehabilitative intervention can induce beneficial long-term effects."
regards, tygr007
There seem to be two chapters, with duplicate content, regarding the spas. It is explained in both Applications and Radon therapy sections. Perhaps they should be merged somehow. -- Bisqwit 10:43, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Uh guys, I think I screwed up when adding that part about removing tumors. Could someone please verify it? Starhood` 21:53, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Can you people please use the {{ Cite web}} template for the references? It will look neater. 74.116.113.241 21:38, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
The Marshalls hat a closer look at the original articles from Drn and Rutherford on the Radium emanation, and they conclude that Dorn only did the same experiments already done by Rutherford in 1900 (citing his article on the gas from thorium) without claiming the gas being a new element. The Book of Rutherford from 1906 is the first source for the phrase: radium emanation and the doing further rearch gaining the insight that the emanation of thorium and that of radium are gases are different, but both from the newly discovered group of noble gases. The credit for molar mass and spectrum should go to Ramsay and Gray like it is done in most papers.
There was radium in toothpaste, not radon! -- Vlad Jaroslavleff 18:24, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
Which of the Lindgren publications is the one used!
Over Underground Coal Mines, presented at the 1989 Annual GSA meeting in St. Louis, MO. -- Stone ( talk) 17:54, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
So you might notice redundant&akward information appearing in several places. I plan to trim it down in the future, but if anybody wants to help he/she is welcome to. Nergaal ( talk) 03:52, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
I will use this references later on. Pls don't delete them. Nergaal ( talk) 13:35, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Nergaal ( talk) 04:59, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
- * ATSDR - Case Studies in Environmental Medicine: Radon Toxicity U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (public domain) - * [2] - * UK site with Radon information and risk reports for UK addresses - * Iowa Radon Lung Cancer Study - * Minnesota radon project - * Los Alamos National Laboratory - Radon - * USGS Periodic Table - Radon - * EPA Iowa Radon Study - * World Health Organization International Radon Project - * Radon Occurrence and Health Risks - * WebElements.com - Radon - * U.S. Environmental Protection Agency — Indoor Air Radon - * Ask TreeHugger: What Do Radon Tests Mean? - * Radon Removal - * Radon Occurrence and Health Risk - * Eastern Regional Radon Training Center - * "Present status of national standards". NIST.
A methodical ten year long case controlled study by Thompson et al. (2008) [3] of residential Radon exposure in Worcester County, Massachusetts (that included carefully placing dose monitors for one year in areas of homes where subjects spent most time) found an apparent 60% reduction in lung cancer risk amongst people exposed to low levels (0-150 Bq/m3; typically encountered in 90% of American homes) of Radon gas. [4]. This study indicates that the LNT is flawed and that there maybe a hormetic effect at low exposure levels. -- Diamonddavej ( talk) 17:09, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
I am trying to understand what is meant by the statement that Radon is "heavy" -- does this mean that a container filled with the gas would be noticably heavier? Is Radon so dense as a gas that a solid (like a piece of wood) would actually float in it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jrm2007 ( talk • contribs) 09:34, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
"Radon, along with other noble gases krypton and xenon, is also produced during the operation of nuclear power plants. A small fraction of it leaks out of the fuel, through the cladding and into the cooling water, from which it is scavenged. It is then routed to a holding tank where it remains for a large number of half-lives. It is finally purged to the open air through a tall stack which is carefully monitored for radiation level."
I don't believe this is true - Radon has too high an atomic number for it to be a product of nuclear fission.
Can someone please provide a citation? If not, I think it should be removed. 59.167.76.11 12:02, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
In the above paragraph, and in other sources which I have read, it states that Radon is the product of the radioactive decay of Uranium, the main article state is is from the radioactive decay of Radium, is it both? Clarification please. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.193.204.68 ( talk) 20:21, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
Peterson, K. A.; Figgen, D.; Goll, E.; Stoll, H.; Dolg, M. J. Chem. Phys. 2003, 119, 11113-11123. Nergaal ( talk) 00:28, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
I would have submitted this article for GAN several months ago, but I waited for someone to wikify and trim down the Hazards section. I went in detail through all the aspects of the article except that one which I found quite repetitive. I am happy that someone else is interested in the article, but pls, try to go through that section and check for repetitivness too (I find it mega boring so I can't make myself do it :| ).
Also, in the future, for any article under the scope of wikipedia:Elements, please list them on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Elements page in the announcement tab. This will attract more reviewers ;). Thanks a lot! Nergaal ( talk) 19:12, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
This review is transcluded from Talk:Radon/GA2. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review. GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria
This article is in decent shape, but it needs more work before it becomes a Good Article.
-- ThinkBlue (Hit BLUE) 22:36, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
In the last revision I edited, I found duplicate named references, i.e. references sharing the same name, but not having the same content. Please check them, as I am not able to fix them automatically :)
DumZiBoT ( talk) 05:09, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
In Italy, after the last earthquake that happened in Abruzzo, Radon caused an discussion between Giampaolo Giuliani and a lot of scientist because his presunted relatioship with earthquake. (in fact, Giampaolo Giuliani made an prevision based on Radon concentration, but the prevision was wrong in date and place, respectively 2 weeks before the accident and 120km near) -- 87.9.254.197 ( talk) 14:55, 4 May 2009 (UTC) (Marcopete87)
The Association_of_American_Physicians_and_Surgeons's journal, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. Unfortunately, this is a quack journal (according to Quackwatch) and should not be included. PDBailey ( talk) 18:32, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
The LNT concept can be a useful pragmatic tool for assessing rules in radioprotection for doses above 10 mSv; however since it is not based on biological concepts of our current knowledge, it should not be used without precaution for assessing by extrapolation the risks associated with low and even more so, with very low doses (< 10 mSv)[.]
Until the [...] uncertainties on low-dose response are resolved, the Committee believes that an increase in the risk of tumour induction proportionate to the radiation dose is consistent with developing knowledge and that it remains, accordingly, the most scientifically defensible approximation of low-dose response. However, a strictly linear dose response should not be expected in all circumstances.
However, problems and possible artifacts of the assay system employed are also discussed. When radioresistance is observed after doses that cause some cell lethality—for example, after chronic doses that continually eliminate cells from the population—the radioresistance that emerges may be caused either (1) by some inductive phenomenon or (2) by selecting for cells that are intrinsically radioresistant. Either process 1 or process 2 could occur as the radiosensitive cells are selectively killed and thus eliminated from the population as the chronic irradiation is delivered. In the end, an adaptive or hormetic response in the population may appear to have occurred, but this would be at the expense of eliminating the sensitive or weak components in the population
Biem, I am not really sure what to say. There is a published work refuting Cohens work, it is well accepted. I have you several additional mechanisms by which one could get such a false result. Cohen's paper fails to test LNT, end of story. It is therefore uninteresting and not germane this article. PDBailey ( talk) 23:40, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
Hello, PDBailey, I've tried to restructure the section "Health incidence of radon exposition", and I read the articles that made a case-control study on radon effects: actually, most of them seem to detect trends, but nothing much convincing as far as hard fact is concerned. I reformulated accordingly and completed the " Epidemiology studies" section. I seize the opportunity to re-read the article and tidy it a bit. Feel free to edit whatever you want to correc (with due respect to Wikipedian principles, of course). Sincerely, Biem ( talk) 20:23, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
No reference is given, no hit on the net, and there is no way radon can be produced in nuclear reactors in significant quantities : it is too heavy to be a significant fission product, and too heavy to be an activation product. Where does this "info" comes from? Biem ( talk) 06:21, 7 May 2009 (UTC)
NFPA 704 safety square | |
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The "health=4" seemed incorrect : exposure to radon does not cause death as hydrogen cyanide would. I changed it to "health=0" in the article, but is there reference data for that ? Biem ( talk) 06:07, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
This section is a bit of a beast and, to me, appears best fitted for a radiation dose response page rather than this page. PDBailey ( talk) 12:54, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
I'd actually say that there is a fair amount on this page that regards epidemiology and statistics and appears to regard environmental carcinogens with special attention to radiation more than radon. PDBailey ( talk) 18:28, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
The following statement was referenced with Darby et al.
There is great uncertainty in applying risk estimates derived from studies in miners to the effects of residential radon, and direct estimates of the risks of residential radon are needed.
I think this is a fair assessment of the article's second paragraph in the Introduction. However, the paper is titled, "Radon in homes and risk of lung cancer: collaborative analysis of individual data from 13 European case-control studies." And so, before the article was written Darby, et al. argue that there needs to be more work on home radon doses. However, the conclusion does not appear so guarded. In fact, they appear to think their paper provided a reasonable answer
We have shwon that residential radon produces substantial hazards, particularly among smokers, even at concentrations below the action levels currently recommended in many countries of a few hndred Bq/m3
Because of this, I have changed the text to read,
While there are studies showing no threshold for response to radon as low as 100 Bq m-3 (2.7 pCi/L), lower doses have not been explored.
I think this is reasonably guarded and at least agrees with the substantial gist of the article cited. PDBailey ( talk) 23:40, 28 June 2009 (UTC)
Pdbailey, Wikipedia:No original research clearly forbids you to draw your own conclusions like in this modification, and especially not by misquoting references.
Actually, if you look seriously at the results of this pooled study, given here [30], you will see (figure 1, p. 141) that no effect is observed at 20 Bq/m3, and that the error bars all cross the "no-effect" axis until the very last (at 350 Bq/m3). Is that the proof you are speaking of? Furthermore, these are but case-control studies, and everybody knows how error-prone these are...
Please stop this POV-pushing about would-be "conclusive" radon effects at low exposures, this is tiresome. Thanks in advance. Biem ( talk) 20:21, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
The Darby article is given here. Read it seriously, with a critical eye. Look at table 3 : nearly all studies are compatible with "no effect" in the 95%CI, and the pooled results barely make a 1.01 above the 1.00 "no effect". Have a look at figure 4 : all the data shown are inconclusive...
The other Darby article collaborative analysis of individual data from 13 European case-control studies pretends that the data is compatible with a linear relationship? sure enough, but it would be compatible with any other kind of relationship, it hasn't proven anything. Have a close look at figure 1, you will see that the data actually falls into three groups : in the 0-100 Bq/m3 no effect is detected ; in the 100-400 Bq/m3 the relative risk is around 0.5 ; and at 700 Bq/m3 it climbs at 2. Doesn't that suggest a threshold to you, especially when radiobiological studies have concluded that the effect cannot be linear? The linear model does not fit very properly in the first place, then "Models with no effect up to a “threshold” dose and then a linear effect did not fit significantly better", sure enough, but both the data and the radiobiology suggest a threshold and a plateau effect, which was not tested - quacks, really, that ignore facts and relevant studies from other fields.
And remember, these are case-control studies, where the real effect can be widely outside the error bars. How conclusive does that seem? Your user page states you are a mathematician and a statistician, you should know better than that.
The papers may have been published in a review, but is still very polemical and disputable. Actually, the French Academy of Sciences 2005 report was (explicitly) written in response to another article by the same author (Berrington dG, Darby S. Risk of cancer from diagnostic X-rays: estimates for the UK and 14 other countries. Lancet 2004;363:345-51.), precisely to denounce it as a quack, because enough is enough (this LNT lobbying has been denounced as the biggest fraud in modern science, in other publications)... A national academy of sciences, against a polemical searcher? Open your eyes, now, its's the same author and the same method - an activist with unreliable results twisted to gain some fuzz around his name. Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools...
If your only aim is to quote that article because "NPOV requires that this not be suppressed", then be happy, it was already quoted. But with such an argument, why do you insist on suppressing the Thomson article, which "showed substantial cancer rate reduction between 50 and 123 Bq per cubic meter relative to a group at zero to 25 Bq per cubic meter" - just because it does not fit your views ?
Be honest and stop that now. Biem ( talk) 07:00, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
The debate about the effect of low level exposures to radiation goes right back to 1900. Pierre Curie's father was a homeopathic doctor and the theoretical model for the original use of radiation from radon and radium in curietherapie was that a small dose of something that is fatal in large doses might be therapeutic. (Pierre experimented on small rodents). Still in the 1980s there were physicists with radiodermatitis on their hands who thought that their low exposure to radiation might have had a therapeutic effect.
I wanted to post a warning that I fear there is confusion underlying the paragraph on Radon in Radiography. That paragraph has no reference given, when I reseached my PhD on the history of the radiotherapy of cancer I came across no reference to it.
It is undoubtedly the case that in many countries radon gas was generated from radium salts in solution, stored in glass or gold 'beads' and used in the treatment of cancer, both surgically implated and placed in a mould on the skin in a way intended to focus radiation on the lesion. The sourcing for that is there in the article and could be massively extended. There is however no reference for radon in radiography in the modern meaning of generating images using (non-light) radiation. Before the first World War when anti-German feeling meant that Roentgenology changed its name to radiology curiethapie was used to describe the use of radon and radium therapy of cancer, lupus, TB of the skin etc.
Of course, people also tried inhalation therapies as well and the drinking of radon solution for the treatment of arthritis. All of the first 4 technicians at the London Radium CLinic where such treatments were given died as a result of changes to their blood cells. In Manchester, Rutherford (before he moved to Cambridge), had to clean up the spilt radium solution that was being used for the generation of radon beads. Soddy, before he worked with Rutherford was also involved in the production of Radon beads.
It is worrying to read on this site that radon solution therapies are being offered again. Polonium killed Litvinenko and is a breakdown product of radon. The history of spillages , explosions and losses in these therapies is quite worrying, in Britain legislation exists to control who can offer radioactive tretments, are patients in the USA not offered similar protections?. Carolinerutter ( talk) 13:13, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
I belive that we are getting closer to making this article FA material. If you find things that need to be done, please create a list that details what you think should be done. Thanks! Wii Wiki ( talk) 21:00, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
This article is quite long, and several sections seem to be candidates for a new article (or new articles). In particular, the sections entitled "Health incidence of radon exposition", "Studies on domestic exposures", and "Health policy on radon public exposure" seem too in-depth for a general coverage of radon; they should be summarized, and the details moved to another article (or other articles) specifically addressing these issues.— Tetracube ( talk) 18:54, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
If someone knows about measurement, and is logged in... please you should change the melting point to: Melting point 202.0 K
Why isn't there an article discussing the use of "radon water", a form of quack medicine from the early 20th century? Beyond this use, radon was also used to "heal" wounds in hospitals, long before anyone knew of radiation poisoning or cancer. It was applied to bandages to "speed the healing process" ... this had great short term results (faster tissue healing), but it caused cancer pretty soon after. In fact, doctors initially considered radon to be somewhat of a panacea due to its "healing" effects. It was around forty years later that the dangers of ionizing radiation were finally appreciated. And yet none of this is discussed anywhere! Fuzzform ( talk) 08:41, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
The lead states that radon is odorless. This may be a picky point, but I very much doubt anyone has ever taken a breath of pure radon to find what it smells like. (And if they have, they probably didn't live long enough to describe their experience.) So it doesn't seem to me that the article should say anything about the odor. Of course, what it probably means is that radon is odorless at any concentration you are likely to encounter; maybe the wording could be changed to reflect that. Kevin Nelson ( talk) 15:13, 6 June 2010 (UTC)
As the author of a PhD thesis on the history of the Radiotherapy of Cancer (University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technolgy 1985? it was a lon time ago). I am concerned about the un-referenced paragraph on the use of Radon in radiography. In the early years of the twentieth century the word radiography did not really exist. In the years before the anti german feeling generated by the first world war Roentgenography was commonly used. Radiotherapy was at that time called curietherapie in an analogous manner.
I never came across any reference to the use of radon in the production of medical images: it was undoubtedly used in the glass and gold seeds reffered to in the paragraph headed radiotherapy. Since there is no reference to any source given in the paragraph headed 'radiography' I suggest that the paragraph be deleted until some reliable source is found. It is likely that there may have been an error at some point in the reading/writing/translation/interpretation of the the term 'radiography' which now means exclusively the generation of images using radiation.
If I am wrong and there is a reference - let's include it. Thanks Caroline Rutter
An IP user has attempted to add a sentence like "The actual number of how high these radon levels were measured at is not known." several times. This still seems like a contentious claim. Somebody did measure how high the radon levels were, how can it not be known? Is there a reliable source that says these levels are definitely not known? Please help me understand what the intent is here. Thanks. Zad68 ( talk) 20:03, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
68.188.203.251 ( talk) 02:40, 5 September 2012 (UTC)
Please explain how this radon glow from condensation would present itself. Example: would a p trap in a shower drain with only a strainer cover in a small apartment in a high rise senior subsidized tower ever glow blue due to condensed daughter particles from radon gas? Would this glow be the emission of alpha particles? Would a glow sufficient to be seen at night without light be significant? If this glow is seen 4 nights out of 7 for hours at a time be of concern? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.188.203.251 ( talk) 02:07, 5 September 2012 (UTC)
207.75.81.12 ( talk) 17:14, 19 October 2012 (UTC) Underestimated amounts of radon off gasses from tree transpiration. Article: http://www.radonleaders.org/sites/default/files/Role%20of%20Vegetation%20in%20Enhancing%20Radon%20Concentration%20and%20Ion%20Production%20in%20the%20Atmosphere.pdf Was not able to find original research on wether or not our human history is an adaptation to significant radon exposure.
I don't know whether it's been confirmed that radon is tasteless. Anyone who inhaled it either would not be able to discern it at all if the quantity is too small or be killed from the alpha radiation. Jasper Deng (talk) 05:56, 9 February 2012 (UTC)
In the concentration scale section, the third section of the table says:
In the next section of the table it says:
The first suggests that above 4 pCi/L there is a potential problem, while the second says that the home owner "should consider" remediation above 20 pCi/L. It's a long way from 4 to 20 -- where should the line actually be drawn? . . Jim - Jameslwoodward ( talk to me • contribs) 14:27, 6 March 2013 (UTC)
This picture is odd enough that this may be WP:OR, or at least needs a citation. It is described on Wikimedia as "a system for (supposedly) diluting Radon into drinking water," but I'm not convinced that's even right. The French translation matches; I can't confirm the Japanese, but I have a suspicion that the intent might be to reduce radon concentration. Could "dilution" could have been misunderstood in translation? Surely it would not be legal to add radon to water in Japan? From examination, it's conceivable that the stainless vessel in the corner could contain some radium-bearing gravel, and the need for radiation shielding might explain why it looks heftier than your typical drinking water component. The other two containers could be filters to prevent pure radium from getting through. But this could also just be an ordinary home-made 3-stage filtration system that would remove radon's parent and daughter elements naturally found in groundwater. There is no bubbler that could really remove radon, but letting the water rest in that glass jar at the end would help evaporate it out.-- Yannick ( talk) 18:53, 1 December 2012 (UTC)
My opinion is that this greenish photograph should be removed. It is not a photo of radon, but a photo of some kind of needle presumably filled with radon which induces radioluminescence of the phosphor layer on which the needle is resting. Radon is a colourless gas, and if no one manages to find a photograph of actual radon in liquid and/or solid state which glows on its own, it's better not to have any photo at all to avoid confusion. Endimion17 ( talk) 14:04, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
You raise some of the same questions that occurred to me immediately. An attention-getting picture, but not necessarily what it is claimed to be. Hopefully something better will turn up. Also, I agree that the Rutherford spectrum image is of historical interest, and is well-placed in the article. Reify-tech ( talk) 14:34, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
Also, R8R Gtrs has gently admonished me to not use the diacritics. Remedied! Double sharp ( talk) 02:37, 31 March 2013 (UTC)
The history and etymology section of this article says that radon was discovered in 1900. But the box at the beginning says 1898. Is it just rounded, or altogether incorrect? -- (T) Numbermaniac (C) 08:50, 7 June 2013 (UTC)
This article contains a lot of unaddressed citation needed tags (most of them years old), thus failing criterion 1b, which requires citations for statistics and challenged material. I will wait a week before closing this reassessment so editors can have the opportunity to fix these issues.-- FutureTrillionaire ( talk) 01:05, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
@ DMacks: Hold on, the article contains at least 5 one-sentence paragraphs (mostly in the Application and Health risks sections). MOS:PARAGRAPHS (which is part of MOS:LAYOUT, whose guidelines need to be met to satisfy criterion 1b) says: "The number of single-sentence paragraphs should be minimized." -- FutureTrillionaire ( talk) 13:55, 24 July 2013 (UTC)
Result: Kept.-- FutureTrillionaire ( talk) 22:27, 24 July 2013 (UTC)
This figure is taken from reference 1 (Toxological profile for radon), but is probably erroneous : living at 100 kBq/m3 would lead to 8 Sv/year, and no WHO official in its right mind would ever recommend that level! I suppose the "kBq" should be "Bq", more in line with the 10 mSv/year limit. Can somebody check that figure? Thanks in advance. Biem ( talk) 07:19, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
...and 100 Bq/l=100 kBq/m³ of course ; but that's for drinking water, not breathing air. Biem ( talk) 18:46, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
I'd say, no. The problem with these analysis is that which is described in the section radon#Epidemiology studies of domestic expositions : First of all, these are but case-control studies (or ecological studies), which are a priori prone to numerous bias - so they shouldn't be taken too literally (just indications that there might perhaps be something like that...). Secondly, all these studies suffer the same problem at low doses: in these areas, the effect is vanishing (predicted and observed), and the data becomes inconclusive. The error bars are compatible with a linear effect, or with a threshold effect, or with any kind of bizarre dose-effect law, simply because the error bars are much too large for anything to be said conclusively. In this context of epidemiological approaches, to say that "The XYZ study has obtained results compatible with a linear law, and no threshold has been observed" is a truism - it would be true of any study, whatever the real dose-effect law is. You may add any number of studies that say so, and add any number of people that believe that the LNT holds, this will not amount to a scientific proof.
On the other hand, see the section radon#Dose-effect model retained : "In the radiobiology and carcinogenesis studies, progress has been made in understanding the first steps of cancer development, but not to the point of validating a reference dose-effect model. The only certainty gained is that the process is very complex, the resulting dose-effect response being complex, and most probably not a linear one." That is hard fact, it is scientifically known that the LNT cannot be correct - but nobody knows what the correct model is.
But given that, saying that so-and-so believes that the LNT may be true is just that - a belief. You may say that a lot of people think that way, it is still a belief. Add a thousand references, it won't turn it into a factual knowledge about reality, just knowledge about what people think? so what?... An encyclopedia deals with knowledge. The knowledge that can be stated has been stated above : "the process is very complex, the resulting dose-effect response being complex, and most probably not a linear one" - and that's that...
Regards, Biem ( talk) 17:08, 27 June 2009 (UTC)
Apologies if I'm posting in the wrong pace here but I've spotted a really major issue out there on the web- there seems to be some confusion between Bequerels per metre cubed (Bq m3), which is claimed by the main article to be the standard measure or radon activity by volume of air, and Bequerels per metre TO THE POWER OF MINUS 3 (Bq m–3), or per Litre, which makes a difference of a thousand- fold! The document below uses the latter units: http://www.hpa.org.uk/webc/HPAwebFile/HPAweb_C/1243838496865 . — Preceding unsigned comment added by Elementperson ( talk • contribs) 18:31, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
Lung cancer from smoking tobacco products is higher from US tobacco products that from investigations of lung cancer vs smoking in other countries with higher per capita cigarette consumption e.g. mainland China. (This has been attributed to fertilization of US Tobacco crops from phosphate mines that once were mined for Thorium. Also note: "An additive rather than a multiplicative model has been gaining support to illustrate the connection between smoking and radon daughter induced lung cancer" [Harely N et al; Environmental Health Perspectives]. Shjacks45 ( talk) 08:56, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
(2011) Journal of Environmental Radioactivity, 102 (10), pp. 901-905 Shjacks45 ( talk) 09:22, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
Radon is the heaviest known gas, nine times heavier than air.
-radonseal.com/radon-indoor.htm
Lighter than air, it rises through cracks and fissures in the ground and can enter a home through cracks, joints and openings in a concrete slab, or move easily through floor, wall and ceiling framing assemblies.
-ezriderhomeinspections.blogspot.com/2008/07/little-information-about-radon.html
Radon is the heaviest of all gases.
-free-radon-test-kits.com/radon-gas.htm (guess these guys know for a fact that its the heavyest gass since chuck norris and any other gass we might discover in the future)
RADON GAS IS PRODUCED FROM THE NATURAL BREAKDOWN OF URANIUM IN SOIL , ROCK AND WATER, IT IS LIGHTER THAN AIR AND MOVES UP INTO THE HOME THROUGH CRACKS AND HOLES IN THE FOUNDATION
-thishomeinspector.com/Radon
I could go on, if you do a search trough google and read the different articles on radon, including the wiki one, one gets realy confused over if its heavyer or lighter than air?(hot cold indoor outdoor or in open space, below ground and so on).
It get sucked in from vacum then supposedly it floats upwards because its lighter and thus travels into ventilation in roof?... Yet its heavyer than air in some articles likes to say it fills the basement pref trough cracks. then some articles says cold basements force the radon out, yet warm basements whit some fire based heaters sucks it inn, yet electric heaters just pushes it down (so the radon is realy close to the floor so getting that into your lungs i suppose would be hard unless you crawl on the floor i suppose?.
Confusion mess§ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.8.130.17 ( talk) 07:22, 11 October 2010 (UTC)
Is radon really the heaviest gase at the room temperature? Some people say that the heaviest gase at the temperature of room is not radon, but uranium hexafluoride. Radon has molar mass of 222 g/mol and UF6 has 352.02 g/mol. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.149.96.128 ( talk) 20:34, 7 March 2014 (UTC)
Melting point 64.052 °C (triple point at 151 kPa[1]) Boiling point 56.5 °C (sublimes)
Thank you, D'Macks! Yes, I've read that the compound UF6 has melting point at 64 and it boils at 56 degrees. But can it be a gaseous substance at 18° if we reduce the pressure?.. About PuF6 – it is completely new for me. Thanks for info. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.149.96.128 ( talk) 14:38, 22 March 2014 (UTC)
Wouldn't it be more accurate to say "second greatest contributing factor to..." or similar, given that cancer doesn't have a "cause" per se, but rather a chance of happening that's increased by exposure to risk factors (radiation, carcinogenic chemicals etc.). A bit anal, yes, but it makes the article less misleading in my opinion. 78.151.181.86 ( talk) 20:57, 7 September 2008 (UTC)