Health
Beta particles are able to penetrate living matter to a certain extent and can change the structure of struck molecules. In most cases such change can be considered as damage with results possibly as severe as cancer and death. If the struck molecule is DNA it can show a spontaneous mutation.
Beta sources can be used in radiation therapy to kill cancer cells.
Read more about this topic: Beta Particle
Famous quotes containing the word health:
“The sick man is taken away by the institution that takes charge not of the individual, but of his illness, an isolated object transformed or eliminated by technicians devoted to the defense of health the way others are attached to the defense of law and order or tidiness.”
—Michel de Certeau (1925–1986)
“To safeguard one’s health at the cost of too strict a diet is a tiresome illness indeed.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“To speak or do anything that shall concern mankind, one must speak and act as if well, or from that grain of health which he has left.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)