Ionizing radiation monitoring tools include dosimeters. They frequently perform a variety of important tasks, such as personal and patient dosimetry, environmental monitoring, spectroscopy, radiopharmaceutical testing, and equipment inspection.
Dosimeters: a device for calculating the amount of ionizing radiation a person has been exposed to over time. Individuals who operate with or close to radiation sources must wear one of three types of dosimeters. The most common and economical badge is the movie badge. It mounts photographic or dental X-ray film that has been wrapped in light-resistant paper.
Periodic inspections of badges reveal how much radiation exposure the wearer has received overall based on the degree of exposure to the film. Nonmetallic crystalline solids known as thermoluminescent dosimeters can be installed and calibrated to provide a reading of the radiation level by trapping electrons when subjected to ionizing radiation. The thermoluminescent dosimeter is reusable, but the ion-chamber dosimeter uses self-reading technology to determine exposure right away.
To be effective, radiation dosimeters must have a variety of desired properties. The capacity to compute the dose to a patient's organ of interest is crucial when using radiotherapy, for instance, when accurate information of the absorbed dose to water at a specific spot and its spatial distribution is essential. Desirable dosimeter characteristics include linearity, energy response, directional dependency, dosage or dose rate dependence, accuracy and precision, and spatial resolution.
Applications of Dosimeters include medical phantom beam and neutron facilities, spacecraft design, and first responders. Diode dosimeters are also used in the applications of radiation dose measurement, room temperature stability, and D=f(D) dependence.
Radiation measurements on board spacecraft provide a useful source of data for high-sensitivity experiments and future spacecraft design. These measurements also provide a record of the dose that has been received by the crew during their missions.
