Talk:Therac-25

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What language does the phrase "beam flattener" come from? The English term for the object which converts an electron beam to X-Rays is "target".

Atlant 01:01, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

the "beam flattener" would probably be the "flattening filter", which is required to produce a 'flat' beam profile at a depth of 10cm (usually). it is a component in the chain after the target. the target dose not produce a uniform beam profile, hence the reason for the flattening filter.... —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 205.211.160.1 (talk • contribs) .

Thanks!

Atlant 18:26, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I read the accident report, and it's fascinating! When used in high-power mode, the beam is supposed to pass through a metal plate which spreads the X-rays out over a large area. This plate absorbs most of the energy hitting it, so they have to crank up the voltage to compensate. Since the plate wasn't in position, not only did the patient receive a lethal 25,000 MEV blast, but it was concentrated into a tight beam. OWWW! TechnoFaye Kane 01:39, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rads

The article mentions that victims received tens of thousands of rads, but makes no mention of what amounts of rads are deemed dangerous (such as a maximal treshold permitted by health authorities). —Preceding unsigned comment added by ToohrVyk (talk • contribs) Pjacobi 00:00, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

You're right. The information is hidden at Sievert#Explanation and the reader is rquired to do the unit conversion and the application of the Q-factor. I'll put this on my to-do-list. --Pjacobi 00:00, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

In the case study written by Nancy Leveson (Univ of Washington) and Clark S. Turner (Univ of Cal, Irvine), the following information is given: "Typical single therapeutic doses are in the 200-rad range. Doses of 1,000 rads can be fatal if delivered to the whole body; in fact the accepted figure for whole body radiation that will cause death in 50 percent of the cases is 500 rads." [bweable]

So why no discussion about what happened to the company? Were they sued? Who are the victims? What was the quality of life like for those who survived? I'm too lazy to login, but I am ClintJCL. [clintjcl]

[edit] 3 or 5 deaths?

The (summary) reference lists 3 radiation-induced deaths (out of 6 accidents), while the article says 5 (of 6). I won't change it myself because the reference may be dated but in that case this should perhaps be remarked upon@?

[edit] Assembly Language?

How does Assembly Language have anything to do with this? It's just a language, debugging isn't the point. The point is that it didn't have any hardware implementations as a fail-safe.

- Klasanov  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.110.74.133 (talk) 17:48, 14 October 2007 (UTC)