gonad, bone marrow and effective dose to the population of more than 90 towns and cities of iran, arising from environmental gamma radiation

background: since 1996 the assessment of environmental gamma radiation dose in residential areas of iranian towns and cities has been accomplished for 10 counties. as a practical method and based on the results of a pilot study, in order to attribute the final results to the whole residential area of a town five stations were selected for every town. the location of individual station was studied closely to comply with recommended conditions in the literature. materials and methods: rds-110 was employed to measure gamma dose rate for one hour. average annual dose rates plus conversion coefficients were employed to estimate gonad, bone marrow, equivalent and effective dose. result: minimum and maximum annual bone marrow and gonad dose equivalent attributed to environmental gamma are 0.24 msvy-1 (for both tissues) and 1.44 and 1.46 msvy-1, respectively. conclusion: average gonad and bone marrow doses for north khorasan, boshehr and hormozgan provinces were less than the corresponding values for normal area. iran. j. radiat. res., 2009 7 (1): 41-47