Lesson Plan: Nuclear Radiation in Medicine Physics
This lesson plan includes the objectives, prerequisites, and exclusions of the lesson teaching students how to determine the suitability of a radioisotope for use in different medical applications.
Objectives
Students will be able to
- recall that only gamma emitters can be used as radioactive tracers,
- recall that isotopes used as radioactive tracers need to have a half-life of a few hours,
- recall that gamma radiation is used for radiation beam therapy, as it is the only type of radiation that can penetrate far enough into the body,
- recall that isotopes used in radiation beam therapy need to have long half-lives of several months or years so that the radioactive sources used do not need to be replaced frequently,
- recall that alpha, beta, and gamma emitters can be used for radioactive implants,
- recall that isotopes used for radioactive implants must have half-lives of several years,
- recall that sievert (Sv) is a unit of ionizing radiation doses.
Prerequisites
Students should already be familiar with
- alpha, beta, gamma, and neutron radiation,
- the half-life,
- the dangers of radiation.
Exclusions
Students will not cover
- using ,
- the calculation of the attenuation of radiation through a material,
- any other type of decay process.
