Hey, all! So, my Patrons had selected The China Syndrome as the next video, however, due to my ear infection I've been fighting most of March and professional obligations, I won't be able to get to that until April. I wanted to do something for March, so I decided to do a quicker reaction to the radiation and acute radiation syndrome portrayal in the last two episodes of Season 1 of The Expanse. Hope you enjoy!
Awesome! I was just going to comment on this very thing. Also consider the movies Silkwood (1983), K-19 (nevermind --- i just saw you did it already), and the Sum of All Fears. Silkwood has considerably more nuclear safety matters and is based on a real life story. The other two movies are good but not exclusively about nuclear incidents. K-19 is a sunken nuclear submarine and the Sum of All Fears is about a nuclear weapon detonated in Baltimore (Tom Clancy book). I'm glad you're doing China Syndrome. Experts may find it to be overly dramatic, but it is a movie, yet still manages to educate people on concepts like "defense in depth", which has evolved to include more than 1 contingency at a time.
@@TheAtomicAgeCM By the way, I'm an airline pilot who happens to have a $100 radiation detector (I once interned at Knolls Atomic Power Lab). Care to analyze a data dump to analyze what my yearly dosage is? I've noticed the uSV measurement is higher in the cockpit than in the passenger compartment. I saw your excellent video on measuring radiation so now I'm curious if my yearly dosage is of concern since we tend to fly a lot compared to passengers.
Oh nice. No, I actually don't really want to analyze that data dump haha too much like work. But, this radiation dose chart says a typical NY to LA flight is about 40 uSv, probably from the cabin's perspective (www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/radiation-dosage-chart/) and this CDC website has some good info about pilot dose, ~3 mSv a year and happens to be the largest of any US-radiation exposed worker [wow] (www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/aircrew/cosmicionizingradiation.html)
In the books this is explained better. The Irradiation was from the reactor core of the asteroid. The radiation included "hard" and soft radiation. They basically got barbequed and it was longer than the 3 seconds they showed on the show. The exit back took an extended level of time, it was almost 5 hours or more until they boarded the Rossi again. As for recovery- yes the machine tried several times to put them into "hospice" mode and provide pain free end of life. in the end it did a flush of all their bodily fluids it could and any medications it had to limit the damage to their organs done by the dosage. The machine did NOT reverse the DNA damage it did. Holden would have to take anti-cancer drugs to suppress and remove aggressive tumors for the rest of his life. This actually a big plot point later in the series.
Remember cancer isn’t the only problem. I think he’s actually right to say the DNA damage isn’t corrected (though I might have said cellular damage to be more complete), I assume part of his point is about the other effects of radiation damage on the cell structure including the DNA. Anti cancer meds are at least a plausible(ish) extrapolation from what medicine can do now, but DNA damage also breaks normal function of the cells themselves needed to keep operating. There are also some direct effects on the structure of cells, including damaging the membranes, but most of the “short term” harm from radiation is from the DNA damage breaking control of various normal cell processes. Among other things, that causes loss of control of apoptosis/cell death, esp in cells related to making blood cells (no red cell production>poor oxygen transport, no lymphocytes/white blood cells>ineffective immune system, no platelets>spontaneous bleeding). Same effect for some other tissues like the lining of the stomach (leads to the nausea etc). So even if they aren’t going to get cancer, without repairing the damaged DNA none of their outcome would actually have changed. Great show, lots of great science, but yeah everything about the medical chairs is basically “magic fix anything” device, haha. (I’m an MD with a prior engineering background that keeps my interest in nuclear tech and space).
@@RocketSurgn_ it would not have been too far fetched that they can slowly repair the DNA damage too. We can, to a limited extent change DNA in cells right now, if you add a century of development, it may be possible to fix this damage. Realistically the therapy would first focus on repairing the DNA in cells which they need short term. Also they can use special medication to stop the cells from apoptosis when they detect the DNA damage, to buy time for the DNA replacement therapy. (this medication in itself would be a powerful carcinogen by the way)
It's also down to (admittedly, fairly hard) sci-fi stuff. One's a Belter, the other's a regular-ass Earth-born human. Miller's constitution was MUCH weaker as a side effect of growing up and living in a low-G environment, much higher chronic radiation doses, poor nutrition, weaker immune systems, and lower-quality health care due to scarcity and poverty. It's a minor plot point much earlier in Leviathan Wakes. Definitely stands to reason Miller would be a hell of a lot worse off than Holden given the same acute dose. On the flip side, it also stands to reason we should give more suspension of disbelief to The Expanse in terms of in-universe pharmaceutical products' capability to combat the effects of acute and chronic radiation sickness. Humanity at this point being an interplanetary species which has to transit between planets and stations the hard(ish) way, that's a lot of cosmic radiation exposure and absorption to mitigate for a lot of people, and it makes sense medical science and technology would advance accordingly.
Regarding the medical treatment - I think they mention in the episode that this is a regimen they will have to follow for the rest of their lives? In which case, it is most likely something like nanites or something similar that targets cancerous cells or necrotic tissue and kills it, plus maybe something like stem cells or something to replace the eliminated damaged tissue? Just hypothesizing here.
SPOILERS FOR SEASON 5 AHEAD Yeah this even becomes a plot point in S5 where Holden is immune to the green crap on the planet whose name I've forgotten thanks to the meds he's on due to this.
You missed the sperm and egg saving routinely done for anyone who spends time in space. Ganymede with the breadbasket in this world and that’s where women go to make babies.
The radiation symbol is commonly used to mark fallout shelters from the cold war era. You get the symbol and a note beneath it that says "fallout shelter". I used to live in a cold-war era building in NYC, and the physical plant part of the building was a designated fallout shelter, marked with the radiation symbol. It's weird, but there you go.
@@TheAtomicAgeCM true, but most people- including me- did not know that not notice the difference in the symbology until you pointed it out. Most of the older buildings on my college campus had these signs directing students to basement shelters, and I never noticed the difference in the shelter and trefoil symbols til you pointed it out.
I just started watching and I like the analysis, could you do the demon core from fatman little boy and surrounding story. Daghlian and slotin. It always scares me, one flash and you are toast.
hello devon! Yes, I'm going to do a whole big reactor whiteboard series. I've been thinking it over as to how I want to handle it but I think I'm going to really include feedback from the viewers. The series isn't for me and I mean it doesn't really matter how I want to organize it, I want to do it in a way that the viewers benefit most so I think I'll start with an intro video of the parts of a reactor (generically speaking) and take the viewers input in to where they want to go from there.
@@TheAtomicAgeCM Thank you for the reply charlie! I think most people would be interested in your thoughts/experiences with these reactors, and why some haven't come to fruition yet. There's plenty of popsci youtubers going over how great they are at a surface level, but not too much information about the unique characteristics and challenges to each.
Really enjoyed this video. Hope to see more of this kind of thing. I agree that it's probably best to avoid the medical aspects of this show because that's probably the most handwavy thing of the series (even the super-sci-fi Epstein drive gets a little bit of explanation).
As a Ukranian, devastated by the war, found some peace in your informative chernobyl HBO videos which are great and STALKER gameplay which is my childhood heh. hope you will react to STALKER 2, sadly it got postponed due to Putin.... :(
Hypothetically, if I were to stick my hand through a small hole in a thick lead shield and give _just my hand_ a huge dose of radiation, let’s say 10 Gray… would I be better off to immediately cut my own hand off? In other words, would the dose “migrate” to the rest of my body over time and kill me? Or would my hand just shrivel up and fall off, leaving the rest of me mostly intact? If it matters, we can say the dose I received was from a reactor core (so, lots of neutrons).
Good questions here, but they're leaving my field and entering health physics/medicine. The dose won't move, no, after you take your hand out of the shield, no more radiation damage is being done. Whether the damage done to that hand will "overwhelm" your body or immune system is another question that I'm afraid I don't know the answer to.
@@TheAtomicAgeCM I’m just thrilled you responded, thank you! I’ve been watching a lot of your videos and this weekend made my girlfriend watch the back to the future one. Thanks for the interesting and entertaining content!
Fun thought of the moment. Depending on how violently somebody is wretching or vomiting, the bleeding may not be directly caused by the radiation. Simply the act of vomiting like that can cause blood vessel damage or a nosebleed which does wonders when you're vomiting.
"I think it is possible for gamma rays to make things in your body radioactive [Like being next to] a criticality accident, which you should not do" Duly noted for the next time I might be near a critical neutron chain reaction.
Dude just popped into your latest video to drop a comment. Found your chernobyl series after rewatching it for the millionth time 😅 whilst digging for more facts about the event. I feel compelled to say that your content is woefully underappreciated, you give thoughtful analysis and facts about situations portrayed in media in a way that's entertaining to watch and listen. Not to mention you seem like a genuinely lovely chap I'm a new sub and I'm here to stay. Please keep up the amazing content ❤️
Thanks so much for the lovely comment! What a great way to start my birthday. I'll keep it coming as long as people keep watching. Also, awesome lambda symbol.
hello! I plan to cover that eventually in a criticality accident series I'm planning down the road. I will cover that accident more from the technical side than the human radiation exposure side, though.
You'd get a lot of gamma ray and neutron radiation. The large containment buildings that house the reactor are not allowed to have anyone in there when the reactor is operating.
Thanks for doing this show. The Expanse is great, especially the first two seasons. In those first two seasons, the directors paid more attention to the weightlessness of space and having to rotate spacecraft, or sections of spacecraft, to create centripetal acceleration to feel like there is gravity within the craft. Those details were present in nearly every scene, or at least enough to feel seamless. In the final 2-3 seasons (Seasons 4-6), those details were mostly absent. The later seasons were still enjoyable to watch, but were much more focused on the emotion of the human stories involved, rather than constantly balancing in the more-realistic effects of being in microgravity that they did throughout the first two seasons. Overall, a great show, most especially the first two seasons in terms of more-realistic scenes of being within a microgravity (i.e. near-weightless) environment. And thank you Charlie for creating these informative reaction videos focusing on the radiation aspects within the shows and what is depicted accurately vs. not so. Looking forward to more of these from you regarding The Expanse!
Awesome content, this is one of my favorite shows and I loved the Chernobyl series as well. Just curious do you know roughly what could cause something like 15 - 30 Gy for reference? Would that be like standing next to a modern nuclear reactor while it's running for an hour or something?
Thank you! Yeah so something like 15-30 Gy would be like standing next to the open reactor at Chernobyl right after it exploded for a few minutes. (www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/radiation-dosage-chart/) I wouldn't want to stand right next to an operating modern reactor but it wouldn't be anywhere near that bad.
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Hey, all! So, my Patrons had selected The China Syndrome as the next video, however, due to my ear infection I've been fighting most of March and professional obligations, I won't be able to get to that until April. I wanted to do something for March, so I decided to do a quicker reaction to the radiation and acute radiation syndrome portrayal in the last two episodes of Season 1 of The Expanse. Hope you enjoy!
Awesome! I was just going to comment on this very thing. Also consider the movies Silkwood (1983), K-19 (nevermind --- i just saw you did it already), and the Sum of All Fears. Silkwood has considerably more nuclear safety matters and is based on a real life story. The other two movies are good but not exclusively about nuclear incidents. K-19 is a sunken nuclear submarine and the Sum of All Fears is about a nuclear weapon detonated in Baltimore (Tom Clancy book). I'm glad you're doing China Syndrome. Experts may find it to be overly dramatic, but it is a movie, yet still manages to educate people on concepts like "defense in depth", which has evolved to include more than 1 contingency at a time.
Nuke em high would be interesting to see
@@AquariusTurtle Already done Sum of all Fears too :) haha. I thought I had Silkwood on the list but it's on there now, could be a good one. thanks!
@@TheAtomicAgeCM By the way, I'm an airline pilot who happens to have a $100 radiation detector (I once interned at Knolls Atomic Power Lab). Care to analyze a data dump to analyze what my yearly dosage is? I've noticed the uSV measurement is higher in the cockpit than in the passenger compartment. I saw your excellent video on measuring radiation so now I'm curious if my yearly dosage is of concern since we tend to fly a lot compared to passengers.
Oh nice. No, I actually don't really want to analyze that data dump haha too much like work. But, this radiation dose chart says a typical NY to LA flight is about 40 uSv, probably from the cabin's perspective (www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/radiation-dosage-chart/) and this CDC website has some good info about pilot dose, ~3 mSv a year and happens to be the largest of any US-radiation exposed worker [wow] (www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/aircrew/cosmicionizingradiation.html)
In the books this is explained better. The Irradiation was from the reactor core of the asteroid. The radiation included "hard" and soft radiation. They basically got barbequed and it was longer than the 3 seconds they showed on the show. The exit back took an extended level of time, it was almost 5 hours or more until they boarded the Rossi again.
As for recovery- yes the machine tried several times to put them into "hospice" mode and provide pain free end of life. in the end it did a flush of all their bodily fluids it could and any medications it had to limit the damage to their organs done by the dosage. The machine did NOT reverse the DNA damage it did. Holden would have to take anti-cancer drugs to suppress and remove aggressive tumors for the rest of his life. This actually a big plot point later in the series.
Remember cancer isn’t the only problem. I think he’s actually right to say the DNA damage isn’t corrected (though I might have said cellular damage to be more complete), I assume part of his point is about the other effects of radiation damage on the cell structure including the DNA. Anti cancer meds are at least a plausible(ish) extrapolation from what medicine can do now, but DNA damage also breaks normal function of the cells themselves needed to keep operating. There are also some direct effects on the structure of cells, including damaging the membranes, but most of the “short term” harm from radiation is from the DNA damage breaking control of various normal cell processes. Among other things, that causes loss of control of apoptosis/cell death, esp in cells related to making blood cells (no red cell production>poor oxygen transport, no lymphocytes/white blood cells>ineffective immune system, no platelets>spontaneous bleeding). Same effect for some other tissues like the lining of the stomach (leads to the nausea etc). So even if they aren’t going to get cancer, without repairing the damaged DNA none of their outcome would actually have changed. Great show, lots of great science, but yeah everything about the medical chairs is basically “magic fix anything” device, haha. (I’m an MD with a prior engineering background that keeps my interest in nuclear tech and space).
@@RocketSurgn_ it would not have been too far fetched that they can slowly repair the DNA damage too. We can, to a limited extent change DNA in cells right now, if you add a century of development, it may be possible to fix this damage. Realistically the therapy would first focus on repairing the DNA in cells which they need short term. Also they can use special medication to stop the cells from apoptosis when they detect the DNA damage, to buy time for the DNA replacement therapy. (this medication in itself would be a powerful carcinogen by the way)
It's also down to (admittedly, fairly hard) sci-fi stuff. One's a Belter, the other's a regular-ass Earth-born human. Miller's constitution was MUCH weaker as a side effect of growing up and living in a low-G environment, much higher chronic radiation doses, poor nutrition, weaker immune systems, and lower-quality health care due to scarcity and poverty. It's a minor plot point much earlier in Leviathan Wakes.
Definitely stands to reason Miller would be a hell of a lot worse off than Holden given the same acute dose.
On the flip side, it also stands to reason we should give more suspension of disbelief to The Expanse in terms of in-universe pharmaceutical products' capability to combat the effects of acute and chronic radiation sickness. Humanity at this point being an interplanetary species which has to transit between planets and stations the hard(ish) way, that's a lot of cosmic radiation exposure and absorption to mitigate for a lot of people, and it makes sense medical science and technology would advance accordingly.
ever consider a video about the movie Elysium?
how about doing The China Syndrome?
it's in editing :)
nice! i will be waiting
The fallout shelters under buildings in NYC all have that symbol to identify them. Though they usually also say “fallout shelter”
Yeah, being next to a running reactor would probably suck…
But that Cherenkov radiation looks so damn beautiful in that pool 😂
don't follow the lights! lol
My wife’s grandparents live right near the sequoia nuclear plant in Chattanooga and have kept iodine pills since the plant was build in the 70s.
Regarding the medical treatment - I think they mention in the episode that this is a regimen they will have to follow for the rest of their lives? In which case, it is most likely something like nanites or something similar that targets cancerous cells or necrotic tissue and kills it, plus maybe something like stem cells or something to replace the eliminated damaged tissue? Just hypothesizing here.
SPOILERS FOR SEASON 5 AHEAD
Yeah this even becomes a plot point in S5 where Holden is immune to the green crap on the planet whose name I've forgotten thanks to the meds he's on due to this.
You missed the sperm and egg saving routinely done for anyone who spends time in space. Ganymede with the breadbasket in this world and that’s where women go to make babies.
10 Grey, Not great indeed terrible
Look up the signage that was used for public 50s-60s era fallout shelters. These also used a trefoil icon.
The radiation symbol is commonly used to mark fallout shelters from the cold war era. You get the symbol and a note beneath it that says "fallout shelter". I used to live in a cold-war era building in NYC, and the physical plant part of the building was a designated fallout shelter, marked with the radiation symbol. It's weird, but there you go.
The fallout shelter one is actually a little bit different. It has three triangles instead of the three circular arc thingies of the trefoil.
@@TheAtomicAgeCM true, but most people- including me- did not know that not notice the difference in the symbology until you pointed it out. Most of the older buildings on my college campus had these signs directing students to basement shelters, and I never noticed the difference in the shelter and trefoil symbols til you pointed it out.
I just started watching and I like the analysis, could you do the demon core from fatman little boy and surrounding story. Daghlian and slotin. It always scares me, one flash and you are toast.
Thank you! and yes, fat man and little boy is definitely in the pipeline.
Hi Charlie! I know the next video is selected, but do you have any plans on covering small modular reactors? Thank you for the great content!
hello devon! Yes, I'm going to do a whole big reactor whiteboard series. I've been thinking it over as to how I want to handle it but I think I'm going to really include feedback from the viewers. The series isn't for me and I mean it doesn't really matter how I want to organize it, I want to do it in a way that the viewers benefit most so I think I'll start with an intro video of the parts of a reactor (generically speaking) and take the viewers input in to where they want to go from there.
@@TheAtomicAgeCM Thank you for the reply charlie! I think most people would be interested in your thoughts/experiences with these reactors, and why some haven't come to fruition yet. There's plenty of popsci youtubers going over how great they are at a surface level, but not too much information about the unique characteristics and challenges to each.
Really enjoyed this video. Hope to see more of this kind of thing. I agree that it's probably best to avoid the medical aspects of this show because that's probably the most handwavy thing of the series (even the super-sci-fi Epstein drive gets a little bit of explanation).
There's an old Mathew Broadrick film called Project X, with chimps being tested for radiation longevity...might be worth a review. Thanks.
As a Ukranian, devastated by the war, found some peace in your informative chernobyl HBO videos which are great and STALKER gameplay which is my childhood heh. hope you will react to STALKER 2, sadly it got postponed due to Putin.... :(
Hypothetically, if I were to stick my hand through a small hole in a thick lead shield and give _just my hand_ a huge dose of radiation, let’s say 10 Gray… would I be better off to immediately cut my own hand off?
In other words, would the dose “migrate” to the rest of my body over time and kill me? Or would my hand just shrivel up and fall off, leaving the rest of me mostly intact?
If it matters, we can say the dose I received was from a reactor core (so, lots of neutrons).
Good questions here, but they're leaving my field and entering health physics/medicine. The dose won't move, no, after you take your hand out of the shield, no more radiation damage is being done. Whether the damage done to that hand will "overwhelm" your body or immune system is another question that I'm afraid I don't know the answer to.
@@TheAtomicAgeCM I’m just thrilled you responded, thank you! I’ve been watching a lot of your videos and this weekend made my girlfriend watch the back to the future one. Thanks for the interesting and entertaining content!
Any time :) Glad you liked it! More to come
Fun thought of the moment. Depending on how violently somebody is wretching or vomiting, the bleeding may not be directly caused by the radiation. Simply the act of vomiting like that can cause blood vessel damage or a nosebleed which does wonders when you're vomiting.
quite true. I think the bleeding on the charts would be generalized whole body type bleeding
"I think it is possible for gamma rays to make things in your body radioactive [Like being next to] a criticality accident, which you should not do"
Duly noted for the next time I might be near a critical neutron chain reaction.
Dude just popped into your latest video to drop a comment. Found your chernobyl series after rewatching it for the millionth time 😅 whilst digging for more facts about the event. I feel compelled to say that your content is woefully underappreciated, you give thoughtful analysis and facts about situations portrayed in media in a way that's entertaining to watch and listen. Not to mention you seem like a genuinely lovely chap I'm a new sub and I'm here to stay. Please keep up the amazing content ❤️
Thanks so much for the lovely comment! What a great way to start my birthday. I'll keep it coming as long as people keep watching. Also, awesome lambda symbol.
Once again, quality content.
Can you do a commentary on Hisashi Ouchi? There are a few videos about his accident and death.
hello! I plan to cover that eventually in a criticality accident series I'm planning down the road. I will cover that accident more from the technical side than the human radiation exposure side, though.
@The Atomic Age
Could you make a reaction video to "The Day after"?
yes! it's been on the list of things for me to get to for a while now and I'm looking forward to it :)
How would being close to a working reactor play out?
You'd get a lot of gamma ray and neutron radiation. The large containment buildings that house the reactor are not allowed to have anyone in there when the reactor is operating.
Thanks for doing this show. The Expanse is great, especially the first two seasons. In those first two seasons, the directors paid more attention to the weightlessness of space and having to rotate spacecraft, or sections of spacecraft, to create centripetal acceleration to feel like there is gravity within the craft. Those details were present in nearly every scene, or at least enough to feel seamless.
In the final 2-3 seasons (Seasons 4-6), those details were mostly absent. The later seasons were still enjoyable to watch, but were much more focused on the emotion of the human stories involved, rather than constantly balancing in the more-realistic effects of being in microgravity that they did throughout the first two seasons.
Overall, a great show, most especially the first two seasons in terms of more-realistic scenes of being within a microgravity (i.e. near-weightless) environment.
And thank you Charlie for creating these informative reaction videos focusing on the radiation aspects within the shows and what is depicted accurately vs. not so.
Looking forward to more of these from you regarding The Expanse!
such a great series
expanse is good too. :3
ohhh boy, i see what you did there. thanks mr sbraz!
Awesome content, this is one of my favorite shows and I loved the Chernobyl series as well. Just curious do you know roughly what could cause something like 15 - 30 Gy for reference? Would that be like standing next to a modern nuclear reactor while it's running for an hour or something?
Thank you! Yeah so something like 15-30 Gy would be like standing next to the open reactor at Chernobyl right after it exploded for a few minutes. (www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/radiation-dosage-chart/) I wouldn't want to stand right next to an operating modern reactor but it wouldn't be anywhere near that bad.
Hope you feel better! Awesome video as per usual :)
thank you! I'm getting there
Very nice video, love the content!
Thank you!
Great video as always!
Thank you!