Development of serum iron as a biological dosimeter in mice

Even though serum iron is a commonly used parameter in iron metabolism, it has not yet been applied for biological dosimetry purpose. A new biological dosimeter based on serum iron has been developed in this work. Serum iron levels in mice subjected to gamma rays from a (60)Co source were detected with the use of ferrous. The doses are from 0.2-7 Gy with a dose rate of 0.2 Gy/min. The results demonstrate that serum iron level increases with increasing dose. The detection limit based on serum iron has a lower limit of dose detection of about 0.5 Gy and the maximal increase of serum iron observed is maintained 4 h after γ irradiation. Therefore the best suggested time for blood collection is within 4 h after γ irradiation. Two dose-response relationships were observed with both according to degrees of the increase of serum iron levels and different intervals after γ irradiation. The first is a linear relationship of y = 0.98x + 6.76 (r = 0.98) obtained 10 min after γ irradiation; the second is the linear quadratic relationship of y = -0.07x(2) + 1.02x + 6.45 (r = 0.99) obtained 7 days after γ irradiation. The absorbed doses of mice estimated with the use of both these two dose-response relationships were close to the actual dose of 1 Gy. It is concluded that serum iron is a quick, simple and sensitive biomarker for early assessment of the absorbed dose of mice.