Hiroshima and Nagasaki Cast Long Shadows Over Radiation Science

Nori Nakamura's mother, who lived near Hiroshima, had a rule for when her son went out to play.

"My mother did not want me to wear colored shirts in the summer," said Nakamura, a radiation biologist, born the year after the atomic bomb fell. "Only white."

The rule wasn't about fashion, he said. It came from a lesson well-learned.

His mother had seen the permanent record carried by survivors of the atomic blast. When the bomb fell, it burned their morning's wardrobe into them. Heat reflected off white tank tops, sparing skin; dark shirts absorbed it, charring flesh in checkered patterns. A mile from its center, the Hiroshima bomb singed black ink out of untouched white paper.

Every survivor of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has a similar story. But while their individual testimonies are moving, perhaps the most important tale told by these men and women -- more than 40 percent of the survivors remain alive -- has been collective. It is how they have lived, and how they die. For more than six decades, their medical histories have provided the authoritative source for how scientists understand the effects of radiation on the human body.

"These radiation standards are accepted worldwide," said George Kerr, a consultant and health physicist, formerly of the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory. "They're kind of the Rosetta Stone."

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