Radium retention and dosimetry in juvenile beagles

Retention of administered 226Ra was substantially greater in beagles injected as 3-month-old juveniles than as 1.4-year-old young adults, but the measured 222Rn/226Ra ratio in bone was significantly less in juveniles for about the first 600 days after injection. An equation that describes the total-body biological retention R in beagles injected with 226Ra at 3 months of age at any time t (in days) after injection during the first 6.6 years is R = 0.331e-0.206t + 0.245e-0.00374t + 0.424e-0.000114t. The rate constant of the final term in the equation for juveniles is similar to that for young adults, suggesting that this component reflects the net turnover rate in the slowly remodeling component of adult bone. Compared to young adult beagles, animals injected as juveniles had a greater fraction of their retained 226Ra in parts of the skeleton containing much cortical bone, such as paws, and a smaller fraction in those parts containing much trabecular bone.