Medical and Industrial Radiation Research
Physical Measurement Laboratory, Radiation Physics Division
NIST only participates in the February and August reviews.
The NIST Ionizing Radiation Division has several accelerator facilities for use in many areas of basic and applied research. The Medical Industrial Radiation Facility (MIRF) includes a continuous-wave, electron linear accelerator operating in the range of 7 MeV to 32 MeV. An electron Van de Graaff accelerator produces beams with energies from approximately 500 keV to 2 MeV. A clinical electron linac has electron beam energies from 6 MeV to 20 MeV and high-energy x-ray (bremsstrahlung) beams of 6 MV and 18 MV. Research opportunities exist in the areas of electron- and photon-beam dosimetry (medical and industrial), detector design and calibration, radiation-hardness testing, personnel protection, radiation modification of materials, waste treatment, and high-energy computed tomography. These accelerator facilities afford the researcher a unique opportunity to develop and test novel dosimetry systems for quantification of patient dose in radiotherapy, or dose delivered to products in industrial electron beam processing. Collaborative work with the NIST SURF III synchrotron ultraviolet radiation facility may also be possible.