Mean values of dose equivalent in the ICRU sphere for limiting the effective dose equivalent

An operational quantity for radiation protection measurements is considered which is additive and whose ratio to the effective dose equivalent is close to one and as far as possible independent of energy. For this purpose mean values of the dose equivalent within various domains of the ICRU sphere have been studied for photon radiation in the energy range between 10 keV and 10 MeV. The mean dose equivalent within the front half sphere differs from the effective dose equivalent by at most 6% for all energies above 20 keV. (author)