RBE-LET relationships in mutagenesis by ionizing radiation

The paper considers the relationship between the quality of radiation and b iological lesions produced by ionizing radiation. The paper provides a brie f review of the modelling of induction of strand breakage, chromosome aberr ation, revertant mutation in bacteria and Drosophila melanogaster. Experime ntal data are presented for the relative biological effectiveness of helium ions and alpha-particles for mutation induction and genome lethality in Es cherichia coli. The paper examines the relationship between the mutational events and LET. The RBE-LET values for T4 phage, E. coli WP2 and mwh (multi ple wing hair) show dependency on LET while the w(i) (white-ivory) allele m utants show no dependency.