Study in Malaysia on ingestion and organ content of trace elements of importance in radiological protection

Involvement in the Reference Asian man project, Phase 2 began at the project, formulation meeting in Hitachinaka City, Japan in February 1995. The objective of the project is to look into the ingestion and organ content of trace elements of importance in radiological protection. The data on ingestion of radionuclides from diet and deposition in tissues are important for estimating internal dose for radiation protection. The meeting agreed the elements of primary interest are caesium, iodine, strontium, thorium and uranium in samples of representative diets and autopsy specimens of liver, muscle, thyroid, bone, and kidney. This report will highlight the methodology for implementation of the project including defining the study groups, sampling duplicate diet and autopsy specimens and the analytical techniques involved. Emphasis will be given to nuclear-related analytical technique (NAA) together with a complementary technique (AAS) available in our institution. Some data on trace element contents of local marine and fresh water fishes and milk was reported. Included also a brief discussion on drinking water quality in Malaysia and some information on related studies available. The information on drinking water will be very useful to the present study since water is part of daily diet. (author)