Possibilities and limits of radioecology

Radioecology - according to W. Whicker - can be understood as being the science, which attempts to comprehend and predict the transport of radionuclides through natural and agricultural ecosystems to a number of receptors such as plants, animals and man, which studies the impacts of environmental radioactivity on plants and animals, especially at the population and community levels, and, ultimately, which uses radioisotopes as tracers in order to understand ecological processes. During the approximately 90 years of radioecology research much progress has been made in this field which has been stimulated by the perception of environmental radioactivity at the beginning of this century, by atomic bomb tests carried out above ground, by the detection of areas with greatly enhanced natural radioactivity, the development of tracer techniques, and by a number of problems emerging in nuclear engineering (licensing procedures, accidents, etc.). In this survey paper the progress mentioned above will be illustrated by some examples; some recent results of relevant activities will be discussed, and the present limits of understanding of important processes and of modeling of the most important transport mechanisms will be indicated. It seems that significant further progress will heavily depend on the status of knowledge accumulated in a broad field of general environmental sciences. (orig.)