Biological Effects of Hirosima Atomic Bombing

Introduction

The atomic bombing which happened on August 1945 during World War II in Hiroshima resulted in a dreadful loss to the people of Hiroshima and even to the entire world. For past seventy years after the Hiroshima atomic bomb explosion, there have been numerous research studies carried out on the biological effect of the atomic bomb to human beings, animals and even plants.1 These research studies have been mainly conducted by scientist and researchers mainly from Radiation Effects Research Foundation, biology and nuclear department of the Hiroshima University, and Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission. The atomic bomb of Hiroshima was made up of a unique gun-type device which consisted of uranium. The Hiroshima atomic bomb was nicknamed Little Boy.

The atomic bomb caused numerous biological effects on both human beings, animals and plants. Some of these atomic biological bombing effects had a long-term effect while others were characterized by short terms effects. An atomic bomb can be described as a bomb which acquires its powerful destructive energy from expeditious nuclear energy release through massive nuclei atomic fission resulting destruction due to released radioactivity, blast and heat. Biological effects can be described as a particular occurrence of various health effects due to ionizing radiation exposure. The biological effects are determined by various factors such as the radiation type exposed, dose size received, body parts exposed, individual age and biological differences. The ionization radiation effects are classified into two major groups namely non-stochastic and stochastic.

The Hiroshima atomic bombing was characterized by numerous biological effects whereby some were short-term while others were long-term. Depending on the critical factors of biological effects determination, the more the amount of radiation exposure, the more the rate of biological health effects and vice versa were felt. Also depending on the age, young people were more prone to biological health effects as compared to other age stages. In addition, depending on the biological differences, certain individuals were more sensitive to radiation hence increasing the rate of biological effects to them as compared to other people who were less sensitive. This paper discusses the resulting biological long-term effects of atomic bomb together with short terms effects in Hiroshima atomic bombing.The short-term biological effects of Hiroshima atomic bombing

There are numerous short-term biological effects of atomic bombing in Hiroshima. According to the biology and nuclear medicine department of the University of Hiroshima, the atomic bombing resulted in various biological acute effects. The enumerated acute effects have been grouped into mechanical injuries, radiation injuries and finally thermal injuries. Radiation played a critical role in causing various short-term biological impacts on the atomic bomb survivors. For examples, some of the survivors from the atomic bomb died five weeks after the explosion due to radiation. The survivor's body tissues experienced numerous sensitivity variations as a result of apparent ionization in the body tissues. The survivor's bone marrows were induced to radiations effects which led to depletion of the bone marrow resulting in loss of lives. The damage of bone marrow due to radiations exposure led to an increase in the rate of blood-related problems such as thrombocytopenia, hemorrhagic tendencies and leukopenia among other infections. Besides, the ionizing radiations of the Hiroshima atomic bombing affected spermatogenesis of the atomic bomb survivors as they are discussed below in this paper.

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