About the Author

          Mr A Nagaratnam received his BSc (Hons) and MA in Physics from Annamalai University in 1946 and 1948 respectively. He also holds diplomas in German, French, and Russian. After a brief stint with the Govt of Madras, he joined DRDO in 1952 in the Defence Science Labora­tory, Delhi. He received advanced training in radiological protection at the Atomic Energy Research Establish­ment, Harwell, UK, and in medical applications of radiation at the Royal Marsden Hospital, London. In his long professional career of more than four decades, he has held several positions including Deputy Director, Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences, Delhi (1963-79); Director, Defence Laboratory, Jodhpur (1979-87); and Emeritus Scientist, DRDO (1987-94). He has wide experience in the medical and industrial applications of radiation, radiation protection and health physics, risk evaluation, medical physics and related fields.

       He was associated with the IAEA in two of their projects as Chief Coordinator and Consultant. He is the recipient of the Vikram Sarabhai Memorial Oration Award and Brig. SK Mazumdar Memorial Oration Award of the Society of Nuclear Medicine, India, as well as the award of the
Indo-American Society of Nuclear Medicine, USA, for his outstanding contributions to the establishment and growth of nuclear medicine in India. He is a past president of the Indian Association for Radiation Protection.

       He is an elected Fellow of the Institute of Physics, UK, and a life member of several professional societies and has served on their executive committees. He has also been an expert member/Chairman of several committees (still continuing in some) of the universities, and state and central governments, the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board and the Department of Atomic Energy. He has over 150 scientific publications to his credit. He has edited conference proceedings and was a Guest Editor of two special issues of Defence Science Journal.

          Mankind is reaping enormous benefits from the peaceful applications of nuclear energy in diverse fields. However, excessive exposure to ionizing radiation can lead to adverse biological effects. Wisdom lies in striking a happy balance in order to ensure that we continue to utilize radiation for human benefit while keeping the potential risks to an acceptable minimum. The Interna­tional Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) has been playing a pioneering role for decades in this field. From 1959 to the end of 1993, ICRP has brought out 64 publications running to around 9000 pages. The present Handbook attempts to give in a concise, consolidated and codified form the salient features of all the relevant information contained in the voluminous ICRP publications. The relevant information pertaining to the methodologies, techniques and the organizational structures that have been developed to control radiation hazards, and, above all, the philosophy of risk evaluation and management that has been evolved, by ICRP, would serve as valuable guides not only to those concerned with radiological protection but to scientists, technologists and administrators involved in all facets of occupational and industrial safety, as well as those concerned with envi­ronmental protection.

The material in this Handbook has been presented in 7 parts, each dealing with one major aspect of the recom­mendations and summarizing the various publications connected with it. These include: main recommendations of ICRP (Part I, 8 chapters); biological effects of radiation (Part II, 7 chapters); internal and external dosimetry (Part III, 13 chapters); operational radiation protection including monitoring (Part IV, 8 chapters); radiation protection in medical exposures (Part V, 5 chapters); exposure to radon, thoron and their daughter products (Part VI, 1 chapter); and optimization and decision­-making in radiological protection (Part VII, 3 chapters).