Industrial use of radiation

In industry, radiation is applied both as an initiator and as a control mechanism on one hand, and as a sustainer of reactions on the other. Among the many industrial uses of radiation, one may mention food preservation, curing of paints, manufacture of wood-plastic combinations, syntheses of ethyl bromide, of ion exchange materials, of various graft copolymers, and of materials for textile finishing. In addition, there are important uses of tracers in various process industries and in mining and metallurgy. 

It is obvious that decommissioning and environmental restoration wastes and the scientific use of isotopes and the industrial use of radiation sources were not an issue at that time. 

Over the last few decades, the use of radiation sources for industrial applications has been widespread. The areas of radiation applications are as follows (i) Wires and cables (ii) heat shrinkable tubes and films (iii) polymeric foam (iv) coating on wooden panels (v) coating on thin film-video/audio tapes (vi) printing and lithography (vii) degradation of polymers (viii) irradiation of diamonds (ix) vulcanization of mbber and rubber latex (x) grain irradiation. 

In 1997, the economic scale of radiation usage was estimated to be 119 billion (1.4% ofGDP) in the United States and 52 billion ( 1 = 121 yen) (1.2% ofGDP) in Japan. In the United States, the use of radiation technology not only in industry but also in medicine is significantly advanced. The usage in agriculture is relatively small compared to those in... 

Two basic types of radiation sources can satisfy the requirement of industrial use of food irradiation ... 

Radiation induced graft polymerization of vinyl monomers and fibrous polymers, Industrial uses of large radiation sources. Vol. I. p. 257.1.A.E.A. Vienna 1963. 

International Atomic Energy Agency,1 Industrial Uses of Large Radiation Sources/ National Agency for International Publications, New York, 1963. 

The use of radiation to modify the physical properties of polymers has become a very important industry with products such as electrical cables with insulation capable of withstanding high temperatures and heat-shrinkable polyethylene. However, of direct relevance to this symposium was the recognition in the early 1970 s that electron beam irradiation of pol3mier films could provide an important lithographic tool for the manufacture of microelectronic components. For consideration of the general principles of these processes see, for example, references (66) and (67). The products required In this field are complex requiring both microscopic... 

Quality control of production has, for many years, been a major concern of catalyst manufacturers. Some methods, such as texture analysis of solids and elemental analysis, have been established for a long time. Others, such as X-ray absorption spectroscopy, are more recent. Analysis techniques as a whole, however, have been subject to methodological research enabling the scope and level of interpretation of results to be developed. Recent decades have in particular seen numerous analysis techniques based on the use of radiation and particle beams applied to industrial catalysts. In view of the increasing number of possibilities for analysing this type of solid in detail, we considered it useful to give an up-to-date assessment of the type of information that each technique can offer. 

Numerous sources of ionizing radiation can lead to human exposure natural sources, nuclear explosions, nuclear power generation, use of radiation in medical, industrial and research purposes and radiation-emitting consumer products. Before assessing the radiation dose to the population, one requires a precise knowledge of the activity of a number of radionuclides. The basis for the assessment of the dose to the population from a release of radioactivity to the environment, the estimation of the potential clinical health effects due to the dose received and, ultimately, the implementation of countermeasures to protect the population is the measurement of radioactive contamination in the environment after the release. The types of radiation one should consider include ... 

V. Y., Pozdeyev, V. V., Ryabukhin, I S., Sheverdina, N. I., Industrial Uses of Large Radiation Sources, Vol. I, p. 83, International Atomic Energy Agency, Vienna, 1963. 

The main reason for the limited industrial application of radiation-induced cationic polymerization is that oligomers that offer high cure rates are not commercially available. So far, due to their excellent combination of chemical, physical and electrical properties, only multifunctional epoxy oligomers have been used, but these have poor cure speeds compared to acrylate based systems. This is a serious limitation. Interesting alternatives to the epoxys are oligomers based on highly reactive vinyl ethers (21. 22) and the recently developed distsrrene ethers (23). which are as reactive as vinyl... 

Radiation methods occupy an important place in the production and investigation of new functional materials, devices, and systems of nanometer size (ion-track membranes, polymeric nanocomposites, 3D nanostructures, metal nanoparticles, carbon nanostructures, etc.). The recent trend towards electronic miniaturization places at the forefront the problem of fabrication of semiconductor nanostructures, which is possible only with the use of radiation lithographic methods. The radiation modification of graphene can play a key role in the development of a new generation of industrial microchips based on graphene transistors, which will lead to a sharp increase in the operation speed and recording density of modem computer and communication systems. 

The rapid development in the use of radiation foreseen in the late 1950 s has not materialized, but, with the gradual decrease in irradiation costs and the significant advances in our basic knowledge of radiation-induced processes, steady progress has been made, with the result that industrial success has been achieved in almost every field of radiation applications. At the moment, many of these commercial successes are relatively small, but decreasing costs will inevitably lead to wider application. 

The use of high-energy radiation in polymer chemistry is one of the major industrial applications of radiation. Main advantages of ionizing radiation initiation include (Charlesby 1960, 1987 Chapiro 1962) the following ... 

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