A review on natural background radiation

Abstract

The world is naturally radioactive and approximately 82% of human-absorbed radiation doses, which are out of control, arise from natural sources such as cosmic, terrestrial, and exposure from inhalation or intake radiation sources. In recent years, several international studies have been carried out, which have reported different values regarding the effect of background radiation on human health. Gamma radiation emitted from natural sources (background radiation) is largely due to primordial radionuclides, mainly (232)Th and (238)U series, and their decay products, as well as (40)K, which exist at trace levels in the earth's crust. Their concentrations in soil, sands, and rocks depend on the local geology of each region in the world. Naturally occurring radioactive materials generally contain terrestrial-origin radionuclides, left over since the creation of the earth. In addition, the existence of some springs and quarries increases the dose rate of background radiation in some regions that are known as high level background radiation regions. The type of building materials used in houses can also affect the dose rate of background radiations. The present review article was carried out to consider all of the natural radiations, including cosmic, terrestrial, and food radiation.

Keywords: Background radiation; cosmic; human's health; terrestrial.

Figure 1

The ordinate shows the neutron dose rate. The curve with the lower slope shows the cosmic neutron dose rate at sea level multiplied by 300 as a function of the magnetic latitude on the abscissa. The steeper curve shows the cosmic neutron dose rate at 12.5 km altitude as a function of the magnetic latitude