Av. Parisi et al., ASSESSMENT OF THE EXPOSURE TO BIOLOGICALLY EFFECTIVE UV-RADIATION USING A DOSIMETRIC TECHNIQUE TO EVALUATE THE SOLAR SPECTRUM, Physics in medicine and biology, 42(1), 1997, pp. 77-88
A cost-effective method employing polysulphone, nalidixic acid, 8-meth
oxypsoralen and phenothiazine as UV dosimeters is presented for evalua
ting the UV spectrum. The exposure measured by each dosimeter is a fun
ction of the source spectrum and the spectral response of the material
. Each material has a different spectral response and records a differ
ent dose for the same exposure. A least squares method is employed to
extract the source spectrum from the four dose measurements. A number
of spectra have been evaluated, and the differences between these spec
tra and the associated irradiances, compared to the spectra and irradi
ances measured with a calibrated spectroradiometer is less than 20%. T
he technique allows simultaneous multisite measurement at positions th
at may be inaccessible to sensitive and expensive equipment. The techn
ique was employed to evaluate the spectrum on the chest and shoulder o
f four subjects. The erythemal exposures were derived from the evaluat
ed spectra with the chest exposures 0.7 to 0.8 those of the shoulder e
xposures.