Hello everyone!
This week during Prof Taylor’s lecture, he mentioned about the activity of elements and I thought that this would be a good opportunity for me to continue on and talk about Radioactive Pollution.
Have you heard of Radioecology? Well, I had not until I was doing more research on radioactive pollution. Well based on the European Radioecology Alliance, it is the ‘study of the behavior and effects of radioactive elements in the environment and investigates the exposure of humans and other organisms to radiation’ (European Radioecology Alliance, 2013). In this post, we shall be amateur radioecologists and find out more about the effects on the environment.
Radioactive pollutants can come from various sources and affect the environment very vastly. It affects not only the terrestrial environment but also the marine environment which then eventually to us humans. 
Figure 1: Model of a scenario of the release of radioactivity to the air, integrating the various ecosystem components (Bréchignac et al., 2016)
Genetic Mutations
High levels of radiation can damage DNA molecules and possibly sequence deletion or chromosomal aberrations (Kaur & Singh, 2019). This could result in various birth defects and also reproductive problems such as impaired fertility that includes reduction in fertility span, litter size etc.
Cell Destruction
Exposure to a high dose of radiation is capable of causing immediate damage to cells and tissues. Radiation is able to distort the cells leading to permanent damage and thus the loss of function and eventual death of the organism.
Figure 2: Radiation damage by 6 months of exposure to gamma radiation (Woodwell, 1963)
Soil Infertility
Radioactive substances in the soil can cause the destruction of nutrients present in the soils leading to soil infertility and toxic. Plants that grow from these soils are genetically modified. Since they are at the bottom of the food chain, this leads to biomaginification up the food chain (Rinkesh, 2020).
Effects on Wildlife & Marine Life
Animals on the different trophic levels are affected differently. Organisms on the higher level are more affected than those on the lower level. All these radionuclides get accumulated in the animal tissues which can enter their metabolic cycle and affect DNA (Rinkesh, 2020). There is thus an increase in mutation rates of animals with high exposure of radiation and higher risk of health issues.
This brings me to the end of this post as we explored some of the effects radiation can have on the environment from complete destruction to gene mutation. In my next post, I will be discussing on the issues of nuclear disasters and their effects!
See you soon!
References
Bréchignac, F., Oughton, D., Mays, C., Barnthouse, L., Beasley, J. C., Bonisoli-Alquati, A., . . . Tsukada, H. (2016). Addressing ecological effects of radiation on populations and ecosystems to improve protection of the environment against radiation: Agreed statements from a Consensus Symposium. Journal of Environmental Radioactivity, 158-159, 21-29. doi:10.1016/j.jenvrad.2016.03.021
European Radioecology Alliance. (2013). Welcome to the Radioecology Exchange. Retrieved August 28, 2020, from https://radioecology-exchange.org/
Kaur G., Singh J. (2019) Effects of Radiation on the Environment. In: Kumar V., Chaudhary B., Sharma V., Verma K. (eds) Radiation Effects in Polymeric Materials. Springer Series on Polymer and Composite Materials. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05770-1_1
Rinkesh. (2020, July 02). Causes, Effects and Wonderful Solutions to Environmental Pollution. Retrieved August 21, 2020, from https://www.conserve-energy-future.com/causes-and-effects-of-environmental-pollution.php
Woodwell, G. (1963). The Ecological Effects of Radiation. Scientific American, 208(6), 40-49. Retrieved August 29, 2020, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/24936182
