Using Python to analyze radiation exposure data

Carol Burns, Reading High School/Quarknet

SECO Conference March 2026

http://bit.ly/4doVhnP

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Prior knowledge:

• atomic structure
• Isotopes
• Valence electrons
• Elements in Groups on the periodic table have similar properties

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New information:

• Radioactive decay
• Information about dial painters

Project Summary

Students formulate research questions about exposure to Radium and use Python to analyze large datasets and present their findings to their peers.

https://oriseapps.orau.gov/CEDR/default.aspx

Examples of Student Research Questions

• Does the number of months worked impact the number of miscarriages?
• Does the amount of time spent ‘tipping the brush’ impact tooth loss?
• Does the number of months worked impact the degree of bone necrosis?
• Did radium dial painters have higher levels of calcium in their bloodstream?

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Project Resources

• Data provided by Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE)
• The Radium Girls by Kate Moore
• W3schools - Python help
• Google Colab

Teacher perspective

I have completed this project with 9th grade students taking grade level physical science and honors physical science.

All of my students must demonstrate an understanding of Ohio PS.M.5

All design a research question that can be answered using the data

Each student ends up on their own journey. Some focus on health data, some focus on ethics - - most students end up on a slightly different path from the one they expected

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Examples of Student Work

Does exposure to radium increase calcium in the bloodstream?

B.H.

Conclusion

by looking at this data in the spreadsheet, determined that 478 patients had Ca above 10.3 whose Ca was reported in mg% (mg/dL) out of 3991 patients whose calcium levels were available

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28 patients had Ca levels above 10.3 mg/dL in the group whose units were mEQ/L.

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13% of the workers in this dataset had elevated Ca levels. In the general population, elevated Ca is 0.1% A more recent source lists 1-2% of general population have elevated Ca.

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B.H.

Was the amount of calcium in the bloodstream increased in the dial painters?

So yes if they had like 8-10.5 amount of radium then yes it would be increase and it would get sick and die. ( A normal amount is like 4.3-5.3)

THIS IS SOME EXAMPLES OF REAL PEOPLE WITH CALCIUM IN THEIR BLOODSTREAM

Isabella Kirk

Findings from “Retention of Radium” & “Blood Chemistry Data” dataset

One person was found to of had 14.8 mg/DL of calcium in their blood.

That matters because Calcium and Radium 226 share the same number of valence electrons, making them very similar, so when radium 226 enters the body, your body cannot distinguish the difference and replaces the calcium in your bones with radium 226, and causes calcium to leach out into your blood. This person worked for only 6 weeks but during those 6 weeks, they experienced major exposure just about every day, and ingested radium.

Landen Asher

Radium affecting the bones

The women working inside the factories were intaking radium through inhaling, lip pointing, and it surrounding their working area. The women's’ bodies had so much radium inside that instead of using calcium in the bone structure process, radium started to replace it. This also caused elevated calcium levels in the blood. The normal amount of women that have elevated calcium levels today is between 1%-2%

Kelsey Rauen

Testing Levels

I took this set of data and I sorted it by 1’s and 2’s. The numbers represent units. Since the data wasn’t taken at the same place and/or at the same time, we had to sort through and separate the units to collect the data. After sorting we put the units together to create the total. In total there were 3,904 patients and 289 of those patients had elevated levels. That means 7% of the women had an elevated calcium level.

Kelsey Rauen

Prior Knowledge

• Students understand that the periodic table is organized by number of protons in an atom

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• Students understand that elements in the same group have similar chemical properties, because they have the same number of electrons

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• Students understand that isotopes are atoms of the same element that have a different number of neutrons

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PS.M.2 and PS.M3

Students are actively learning

• The strong nuclear force holds protons and neutrons together in the nucleus of an atom - it is stronger than the electromagnetic force between protons
• Radioactive decay occurs when a nucleus is unstable.
• Unstable means the strong force cannot overcome the electromagnetic force between protons (repulsion is greater than strong force)
• Elements with more than 82 protons are unstable
• Most stable elements have a neutron to proton ratio greater than 1, a few stable isotopes have a n:p of 1 and 2 have n:p less than 1 (1H, 3He)

PS.M.5

Students are actively learning

• There are 3 types of radioactive decay
• Alpha
• An alpha particle is released (2p, 2n)
• Since the # of protons change, a new element is formed
• Alpha emitters are very harmful when inhaled or swallowed
• Beta
• A neutron becomes a proton and an electron is emitted
• Or a proton become a neutron and a positron is emitted
• # of protons changes - a new element is formed
• Gamma
• High energy electromagnetic waves are released
• Decay chains describe the multi-step process of an atom becoming a stable atom of a different element

PS.M.5

http://bit.ly/4doVhnP

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Cburns@readingschools.org

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Quarknet Coding Camp 1 applications due Sunday, March 27