The rapid growth of the world population - nearly six-fold over the last hundred years - combined with the rising number of technical installations especially in the industrialized countries has lead to ever tighter and more strained living spaces on our planet. Because ofthe inevitable processes oflife, man was at first an exploiter rather than a careful preserver of the environment. Environmental awareness with the intention to conserve the environment has grown only in the last few decades. Environmental standards have been defined and limit values have been set largely guided, however, by...

Die strahlenbiologische Forschung ist beinahe ebenso alt wie die Erkenntnis, daB es radioaktive Isotope gibt, die ionisierende Strahlen aussenden. Derartige Untersuchungen entsprangen nicht, wie es manch mal scheinen mag, der Angst vor den Gefahren dieser Strahlung sondern vielmehr dem Trieb des Menschen, die Umwelt mit ihren Phiinomenen zu erfassen. Heute, in einer Zeit, die sich anschickt, mit der Kerntechnik zu leben, stellt sich die Frage nach den biologischen Wirkungen ionisierender Strahlen zwar mit einer besonderen Aktuali tat. Sie sollte jedoch vor allem aus der Grundhaltung...

Studies on the effects of hyperthermia have aroused great interest in recent years. On the one hand, it has been demonstrated. that hyperthermia may be a useful treatment modality for tumors, in combination with ionizing radia tion or cytotoxic drugs. On the other hand, it is of great scientific interest to study the effects of increased temperature on biological systems. Although hyperthermia has been used in the treatment of cancer for cen turies, its therapeutic success was doubtful. However, since it has been shown that radiation-induced cell killirtg can be remarkably enhanced by...