Ernest Wollan's Film Badge from Manhattan Project (ca.1943) |
||
|
This is an example of the first mass-produced film badge. It was developed (pun intended) by Ernest Wollan for use at the University of Chicago Metallurgical Laboratory during World War II. Film had been used previously (as early as 1905) to evaluate radiation exposures, but the methods were primitive at best. For example, one method that was used well into the late 1930s involved holding the developed film against a newspaper. If the newspaper could be read through the film, the exposure was low enough to be acceptable. | |
|
The photo to the right shows the version of Wollan's badge used at Oak Ridge National Laboratory ca. 1950. Badges donated by Herb Pomerance and John Wollan |
|
|
|
Wollan headed up the radiation protection program at Chicago during the Manhattan project and was the first to employ the title "Health Physicist." For a story regarding Wollan's accomplishments, click here. One important characteristic of this badge design is that it employed filtration (1 mm cadmium) to reduce the variations in the film's response to radiation of different energies. Reference: Pardue, Goldstein and Wollan, Photographic Film as a Pocket Dosimeter, Metallurgical Laboratory Report CH-1553, April, 1944. US Patent 2,483,991 Radiation Exposure Meter, Ernest Wollan, and Louis Pardue. Personal communication, Herb Pomerance
|
||
