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February 23, 2018 by Nukewatch Leave a Comment

Threats of Mass Destruction Are All ‘Mentally Deranged’

The US maintains a fleet of heavy long-range B-52 bombers like this one that carry nuclear-armed Cruise missiles and B61 nuclear gravity bombs, among many others, and which regularly fly “exercises” near North Korea.

After Trump’s Sept. 23 bombast at the United Nations where he claimed the US might “have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea,” the propagandists in Pyongyang responded quickly, calling him a “mentally deranged dotard.” During Trump’s 2017 visit to South Korea, an editorial in the Minju Joson, a state-run newspaper published in Pyongyang, said the president’s speech to the South’s parliament was a “load of rubbish spouted by the old lunatic Trump” and “was all nonsense.”

“Far from making remarks of any persuasive power that can be viewed to be helpful to defusing tension, he made unprecedented rude nonsense one has never heard from any of his predecessors,” the North’s President Kim Jong-un said after Trump’s UN bomb threat.

Of course the imbecility of Trump’s speech is almost always rude nonsense, but his White House predecessors have been nearly as bloodthirsty in their overt threats against North Korea. While Trump certainly speaks like a mentally deranged dotard, his threat to totally destroy a country of 25 million people is only as deranged as those made by earlier presidents.

On July 12, 1993, Bill Clinton was in South Korea and warned that if the North developed and used an atomic weapon, the United States would “overwhelmingly retaliate,” and he adding chillingly, “It would mean the end of their country as they know it.”

George Bush continued the routine, hatefully naming North Korea part of an “axis of evil” during his 2002 State of the Union speech. Bush’s choice of the word “axis” usefully conjured images of Hitler Fascism, against which any atrocity can of course be excused.

Likewise, Barack Obama calmly threatened the North during his April 2014 visit to Seoul, saying, “We will not hesitate to use our military might to defend our allies and our way of life.” Calling the North “a pariah state that would rather starve its people than feed their hopes and dreams,” Obama hearkened back to the country’s terrible 1996-1998 famine — “one of the great famines of the 20th Century” according to UN aid agencies. Obama conveniently neglected to recall much less apologise for any US responsibility in failing to provide adequate emergency food aid to the starving.

Nowadays, Trump gets rightfully condemned for making threats of mass destruction against the tiny, underdeveloped North, especially as he sits at the head of the grandest military empire in the history of the world, with 12 ballistic missile submarines, 19 aircraft carrier battle groups, 450 land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, almost 800 military bases in 70 countries and territories abroad, and shooting wars underway in seven different countries.

Yet jittery trepidation regarding phantom threats by North Korea is routinely, almost universally voiced — even if it’s just as routinely debunked. In 1996, the editors at the New York Times warned, “North Korea could threaten parts of Hawaii and Alaska” in less 10 years. (“Star Wars, the Sequel” May 14) Now 22 years on, the North still can’t do it. In 2000, the same editors said US intelligence agencies “predict that North Korea could have the capacity to launch a handful of nuclear-tipped long-range missiles within five years.” (“Prelude to a Missile Defense,” Dec. 19) Eighteen years later, it still can’t.

Fearmongering about North Korea always lacks any evidence that its ruling regime is suicidal, because there is no such evidence. Never explained by our military-industrial-Congressional weapons merchants, newspaper and TV pundits, or think tank analysts is why the North would precipitate its inevitable self-destruction by attacking the United States or its allies, because it never would.

A few reporters have managed to fit this acknowledgment into their stories, and for this they need to be recognized. Jessica Durando, writing in USA Today Nov. 21, 2017, said North Korea’s leader appears “determined to keep his nuclear arsenal to deter a U.S. attempt to overthrow him.”

And journalist Loretta Napoleoni, author of the brand new “North Korea: The Country We Love to Hate” (2018, University of Western Australia Press), spoke to the London Express Feb. 20, saying about the North’s arsenal of 10 to 12 unusable nuclear bombs: “I don’t think they have any intention to use it. It is a deterrent,” Napoleoni said, “and very much what they wanted to achieve in order to make sure that nobody would attack them ever again.”

In view of the just-announced joint US/South Korean military invasion rehearsals known as “exercises” now set for April, North Korea is the place for legitimate trepidation.

— John LaForge 

 

Filed Under: Military Spending, Nuclear Weapons, Weekly Column Tagged With: deterrence, North Korea, nuclear threats, nuclear weapons, Pentagon, war, weapon

February 16, 2018 by Nukewatch Leave a Comment

Unwinnable War Budget Goes Nuclear

In keeping with the Trump Administration’s Feb. 2nd Nuclear Posture Review, Trump’s just-released Fiscal Year 2019 federal budget proposal dramatically ramps-up nuclear weapons research and production.

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), the Department of Energy’s semi-autonomous nuclear weapons agency, is receiving a $2.2 billion overall boost to $15.1 billion, a 17 percent increase above FY 2018. Of that, a full $12.8 billion is for nuclear weapons — 8 percent above FY 2018.

The NNSA’s “Directed [nuclear weapons] Stockpile Work” is increased 41 percent, from $3.3 billion to $4.7 billion. The “stockpile” programs are the hands-on, nut-and-bolts operations that include extending the operational service time of today’s nuclear weapons for up to 60 years, while also endowing them with new military capabilities.

In addition, the NNSA budget shows the addition of another $1.76 billion to “Nuclear Weapons Activities,” for a grand total FY 2019 budget of $12.78 billion. The document doesn’t make clear where the additional money comes from. In the past it’s been drawn from Pentagon, but elsewhere in Trump’s budget there is a cut of over $17 billion from the anti-poverty Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which ought to cover the NNSA.

Of course, these figures cover just one fiscal year. Enormous as they are, they’re merely down-payments that only open the door on a proposed 30-year nuclear weapons “rebuild.” The $1.74 trillion “upgrade” includes $313 billion for a new fleet of missile-launching submarines; $13 billion for a “smart” hydrogen bomb the United States has never built before; $50 billion for a so-called “interoperable” nuclear warheads intended for use on either submarines, rockets, or missiles; $127 billion for a new heavy, long-range bomber dubbed the “China bomber” (to improve relations with our No. 1 trading partner); $30 billion for a new nuclear-armed Cruise missile; $149 billion for 600 new land-based missiles; and another $261 billion to rebuilt the Y-12 bomb plant in Tennessee, the Los Alamos Lab in New Mexico, and the (already finished) Kansas City bomb plant in Missouri.

Trump’s plan also calls for a 13 percent increase in over all military spending (about $80 billion), raising Pentagon allotment to $686 billion. Can you say “national bankruptcy”?

In a show of fiscal responsibility, some of the increases in weapons and war planning programs are being offset by deep cuts to the social safety net, education and healthcare programs. Although Mr. Trump’s political base of undereducated white supremacists are the biggest user of food stamps in the country, his budget slashes the Department of Education by over 10 percent, and bars Food Stamp recipients from buying fresh food and vegetables, “providing only a box food delivery program,” Democracy Now! reported. Trump’s budget also phases out federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting which supports public and community radio and TV stations, also known as Educational TV. With cuts to health, education and nutrition programs, you’d think the Self-proclaimed “genius” was trying to dumb down the electorate.

Jay Coghlan of Nuclear Watch New Mexico summed up the fiscal year plan this way: “Trump’s budget prepares for nuclear war, which even Ronald Reagan said ‘can’t be won and must never be fought.’ It finances a new arms race with Russia and increases the chances of a nuclear war with North Korea. It further raids the treasury by diverting huge sums of money to the usual fat cat nuclear weapons contractors.”

There must be a way to cut military spending, but we would have to be able to grasp its magnitude. In just the fiscal year 2015, the warplane, missile and satellite maker Lockheed Martin Corporation alone won $46 billion in military contracts. –John LaForge

Filed Under: Nuclear Weapons, Weekly Column Tagged With: B61 gravity bombs, Department of Energy, nuclear, nuclear weapons, war, weapon

June 27, 2017 by Nukewatch Leave a Comment

Chomsky on North Korea’s Provocations & Ours

U.S. Air Force attacking railroads south of Wonsan on the eastern coast of North Korea during Korean War.

Editor’s Note: In the context of a broader discussion, M.I.T. Professor Emeritus Noam Chomsky, speaking in April in Cambridge, Massachusetts, was asked by Democracy Now news anchor Amy Goodman: “Do you think there is a possibility that the US would at­tack North Korea?” Chomsky’s answer is instructive in view of the ongoing US/South Korean wargames off the Korean coast which now involve two US air­craft carrier battle groups.

Noam Chomsky: I doubt it very much. The reason is very simple.

An attack on North Korea would unleash … a massive artillery bombardment of Seoul, the big­gest city in South Korea and right near the border, which would wipe it out including plenty of Ameri­can troops. As far as I can see, there is no defense against that.

Furthermore, North Korea could retaliate against American bases in the region where there are plenty of US soldiers. They’d be devastated; North Korea would be finished; so would much of the region. But if attacked, presumably they would respond, very likely. In fact the responses might be automatic. [National Security Advisor, General Herbert Ray­mond] McMaster at least, and [Secretary of De­fense, General James] Mattis understand this. How much influence they have, we don’t know. So I think an attack is unlikely.

But the real question is: Is there a way of dealing with the problem? There are a lot of proposals. Sanctions. A big new missile defense system—which is a major threat to China and will increase tensions there. Military threats of various kinds. Sending an aircraft carrier, the [USS Carl] Vinson to North Korea…. Those are the kind of proposals as to how to solve it.

Actually there’s one proposal that’s ignored. It’s a pretty simple proposal. Remember: the goal is to get North Korea to freeze its weapons and missiles systems.

So, one proposal is to accept their offer to do that. It sounds simple. They have made a proposal—China and North Korea—have proposed to freeze the North Korean missile and nuclear weapons sys­tems and the US instantly rejected it. And you can’t blame that on Trump. Obama did the same thing. A couple of years ago the same offer was presented, I think it was 2015, the Obama administration in­stantly rejected it.

And the reason is that it calls for a quid pro quo. It says in return the US should put an end to threaten­ing military maneuvers on North Korea’s borders, which happen to include, under Trump, sending of nuclear-capable B52s [and B1 and B2 bombers] fly­ing right near the border.

Maybe Americans don’t remember very well, but North Koreans have a memory of, not too long ago, when North Korea was absolutely flattened, liter­ally, by American bombing. There were literally no targets left.

I really urge people who haven’t done it to read the official American military histories, the Air Quarterly Review, the military histories describing this. They describe it very vividly and accurately. They say there just weren’t any targets left. So what could we do? Well, we decided to attack the dams, the huge dams—a major war crime. People were hanged for it at Nuremberg, but put that aside. And then comes an ecstatic, gleeful description of the bombing of the dams and the huge flow of water which was wiping out valleys and destroying the rice crop, “upon which Asians depend for surviv­al”—lots of racist comments—but all with exalta­tion and glee. You really have to read it to appreciate it. The North Koreans don’t have to bother reading it. They lived it.

So when nuclear-capable B52s [etc.] are flying on their border, along with other threatening military maneuvers, they’re kind of upset about it. Strange people. And they continue to develop what they see as a potential deterrent that might protect the regime, and the country in fact, from destruction. …

Filed Under: Newsletter Archives, North Korea, Nuclear Weapons, Quarterly Newsletter Tagged With: weapon

June 26, 2017 by Nukewatch 1 Comment

Counting Carriers, or, When is an F-35B not an aircraft?

Summer Quarterly 2017

In the post-fact US Navy, the USS America, left,  with up to 2,930 personnel and a compliment of 20 F-35B fighter jets, is not an aircraft carrier.

The Pentagon likes to say it has 10 aircraft carriers, the 10 Nimitz-class “super carriers” that displace 100,000 tons, and carry up to 6,000 people. But it actually has nineteen.

The 19 carriers are not for deterrence or defense, considering Russia, China, Brazil, India, France and Thailand each have exactly one. Italy and Spain have two each, but they’re NATO allies.

Not counted by the Pentagon are its Tarawa-class carriers with 2,800 people onboard. Three football fields long, and 20 stories high, the Tarawa ships “have the general profile of an aircraft carrier,” as the website GlobalSecurity.org notes. They carry 35 fighter aircraft, including Harrier fighter jets, Harrier jump jets, helicopters, reconnaissance aircraft and thousands of tons of langing vehicles for invasions.

The eight other giant carriers are 45,000-ton Wasp-class behemoths, known instead as “amphibious assault ships” that the Navy calls “the largest amphibious ships in the world.” They launch helicopters, jump jets, hovercraft, landing craft and assault vehicles, and carry up to 2000 Marines. Used for waging war “forward…from the sea,” and “assault by air,” each of the eight Wasps have a 600-bed hospital.

Two of the newest carriers—the $3.5 billion USS America and USS Tripoli—are “considerably larger than recent aircraft-carrying ships constructed for the Korean, Japanese, and Australian navies,” according to Robert Farley of the University of Kentucky’s Patterson School. The America-class will carry up to 20 Marine Corps F-35B fighter jets, plus Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft, and helicopter gunships.

Not satisfied with a 19-to-one advantage, the Navy is sea testing the biggest carrier on Earth, the Gerald R. Ford, a 100,000-ton, $10 billion giant that has a crew of 4,300 and carries a fleet of 90 aircraft.

—Lockheed Martin; The Diplomat, April 17, 2014; GlobalSecurity.org, “World Wide Aircraft Carriers – 2014”

Filed Under: Military Spending, Newsletter Archives, Nuclear Weapons, Quarterly Newsletter Tagged With: nuclear weapons, Pentagon, war, weapon

October 7, 2016 by Nukewatch Leave a Comment

Depleted Uranium

smallduposter

Related Articles from the Nukewatch Quarterly

Depleted Uranium: Weapon of Mass Destruction

In the 1991 Persian Gulf War, U.S. forces used depleted uranium as both armor piercing bullets and as tank armor for the first time. These weapons are both radioactive and toxic. Uranium Oxide particles formed during production, testing, and battlefield use pose a long term threat to human health and the environment.

Uranium weapons are effective antitank “penetrators” because they are extremely dense. A slug of uranium weighs twice as much as a piece of lead the same size. When alloyed with titanium, uranium is extremely hard. Uranium is also “pyrophoric”, which means it burns upon impact.

The U.S. Military chose to develop uranium weapons not only because they are promised to be effective, but because the metal itself is very cheap. Depleted uranium is material that remains when enriched fissionable uranium- that is, capable of generating a nuclear explosion or nuclear power- is separated from natural uranium. The U.S. stockpile exceeds a billion pounds. Uranium weapons production is the nuclear bombmakers’ idea of “recycling”.

The Agent Orange of the 90’s

Depleted Uranium is not capable of an atomic chain reaction. It is not considered a high-level radioactive material. As a metal slab, like the armor plates in the U.S. Army’s M1 Abrams tanks, it is a relatively harmless. Though constant exposure could cause problems. But especially in particulate form, it can be extremely hazardous.

When uranium weapons burn, when they corrode, and when they are machined, uranium oxide dust is created. When inhaled, small particles-those less than 5 millionths of a meter-can lodge in a human lung tissue, exposing the host to a growing dose of alpha radiation. This can cause lung cancer in people of all ages, and is particularly hazardous to children.

Uranium, like lead and other heavy metals, is a chemical poison. The ingestion of minute quantities of uranium in food or drinking water can cause irreparable damage to the kidneys. Some experts consider this is a greater risk than radiation from depleted uranium.

Uranium weapons may be the “Agent Orange of the 90’s” because large numbers of people, friend and foe are being exposed to uranium oxide dust. We won’t know for 20-30 years the full significance of that exposure, but by then it will be too late. Here are a few examples of that exposure:

The U.S. Military, which fired thousands of uranium shells during the Persian Gulf War, left at least 387 tons of spent uranium munitions in Kuwait and southern Iraq after the war. The U.S. Government believes, based upon weapons tests in the U.S. and general knowledge about wind patterns, that there is no health or environmental hazard, but it has not undertaken any study of battlefield areas.

After the Persian Gulf War, contaminated U.S. armored vehicles were prepared for disposal in the United States. The U.S. soldiers–at least 25– who handled those vehicles were not warned of DU hazards or wore any protective gear.

Army weapons testers at the Jefferson Proving Ground in Indiana fired DU rounds at soft targets-cloth or plywood- to avoid combustion. Still, only 22,000kg of the 91,000kg fired there between 1984 and 1992 were recovered in biannual clearance operations. The Army will have to strip away several feet of soil during decontamination. This will increase soil erosion and the migration of DU.

The NRC permitted Nellis Air Force Base to receive and process up to 77,000 lbs. of DU rounds. These rounds were used in testing on the base’s Range 63 using tanks as targets. In 1980, NL Industries Uranium Weapons factory in Clonie, New York was forced to close. Uranium particles were found as far as 26 miles downwind.

In 1981, workers at Aerojet’s TNS Uranium Weapons Plant in Jonesborough, Tennessee went on strike because of plant conditions that caused an epidemic of uranium poisoning.

At Nuclear Metals Inc., which manufactures uranium weapons in Concord, Massachusetts, radioactive materials have contaminated surface water, ground water, and land. Independent testing done by Citizens Research and Environmental Watch(CREW), a local grassroots organization, found DU 18 times the background level and up to 9/10ths of a mile away. Concord has the second highest level of thyroid cancer in the state, 2 1/2 times the state average. — Military Toxics Project


Related Links And Resources

Alexandra C. Miller is a senior scientist with the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute and an assistant professor at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland. Dr. Miller has numerous publications in the area of depleted uranium health hazards and is the author of Depleted Uranium, Properties, Uses, and Health Consequences from the CRC Press.

Urinary and serum mutagenicity studies with rats implanted with depleted uranium or tantalum pellets

During the 1991 Persian Gulf War several US military personnel were wounded by shrapnel fragments consisting of depleted uranium. These fragments were treated as conventional shrapnel and were not surgically removed to spare excessive tissue damage. Uranium bioassays conducted over a year after the initial uranium injury indicated a significant increase in urine uranium levels above natural background levels. The potential mutagenic effects of depleted uranium are unknown. To assess the potential mutagenic effects of long-term exposure to internalized depleted uranium, Sprague-Dawley rats were implanted with depleted uranium and their urine and serum were evaluated for mutagenic potential at various times after pellet implantation using the Ames Salmonella reversion assay. Tantalum, an inert metal widely used in prosthetic devices was used for comparison. Enhancement of mutagenic activity in Salmonella typhiurium strain TA98 and the Ames II™ mixed strains (TA7001-7006) was observed in urine samples from animals implanted with depleted uranium pellets. In contrast, urine samples from animals implanted with tantalum did not show a significant enhancement of mutagenic activity in these strains. In depleted uranium-implanted animals, urine mutagenicity increased in a dose- and time-dependent manner demonstrating a strong positive correlation with urine uranium levels (r = 0.995, P < 0.001). There was no mutagenic enhancement of any bacterial strain detected in the sera of animals implanted with either depleted uranium or tantalum pellets. The results suggest that uranium content in the urine is correlated with urine mutagenicity and that urinary mutagenicity might be used as a biomarker to detect exposure to internalized uranium.

Depleted uranium-catalyzed oxidative DNA damage: absence of significant alpha particle decay

Depleted uranium (DU) is a dense heavy metal used primarily in military applications. Published data from our laboratory have demonstrated that DU exposure in vitro to immortalized human osteoblast cells (HOS) is both neoplastically transforming and genotoxic. DU possesses both a radiological (alpha particle) and a chemical (metal) component. Since DU has a low-specific activity in comparison to natural uranium, it is not considered to be a significant radiological hazard. In the current study we demonstrate that DU can generate oxidative DNA damage and can also catalyze reactions that induce hydroxyl radicals in the absence of significant alpha particle decay. Experiments were conducted under conditions in which chemical generation of hydroxyl radicals was calculated to exceed the radiolytic 6 generation by 10 -fold. The data showed that markers of oxidative DNA base damage, thymine glycol and 8-deoxyguanosine could be induced from DU-catalyzed reactions of hydrogen peroxide and ascorbate similarly to those occurring in the presence of iron catalysts. DU was 6-fold more efficient than iron at catalyzing the oxidation of ascorbate at pH 7. These data not only demonstrate that DU at pH 7 can induced oxidative DNA damage in the absence of significant alpha particle decay, but also suggest that DU can induce carcinogenic lesions, e.g. oxidative DNA lesions, through interaction with a cellular oxygen species. Published by Elsevier Science Inc.

Effect of the militarily-relevant heavy metals, depleted uranium and heavy metal tungsten-alloy on gene expression in human liver carcinoma cells (HepG2)

Depleted uranium (DU) and heavy-metal tungsten alloys (HMTAs) are dense heavy-metals used primarily in military applications. Chemically similar to natural uranium, but depleted of the higher activity 235U and 234U isotopes, DU is a low specific activity, high-density heavy metal. In contrast, the non-radioactive HMTAs are composed of a mixture of tungsten (91–93%), nickel (3–5%), and cobalt (2–4%) particles. The use of DU and HMTAs in military munitions could result in their internalization in humans. Limited data exist however, regarding the long-term health effects of internalized DU and HMTAs in humans. Both DU and HMTAs possess a tumorigenic transforming potential and are genotoxic and mutagenic in vitro. Using insoluble DU-UO2 and a reconstituted mixture of tungsten, nickel, cobalt (rWNiCo), we tested their ability to induce stress genes in thirteen different recombinant cell lines generated from human liver carcinoma cells (HepG2). The commercially available CAT-Tox (L) cellular assay consists of a panel of cell lines stably transfected with reporter genes consisting of a coding sequence for chloramphenicol acetyl transferase (CAT) under transcriptional control by mammalian stress gene regulatory sequences. DU, (5–50 μg/ml) produced a complex profile of activity demonstrating significant dose-dependent induction of the hMTIIA FOS, p53RE, Gadd153, Gadd45, NFκBRE, CRE, HSP70, RARE, and GRP78 promoters. The rWNiCo mixture (5–50 μg/ml) showed dose-related induction of the GSTYA, hMTIIA, p53RE, FOS, NFκBRE, HSP70, and CRE promoters. An examination of the pure metals, tungsten (W), nickel (Ni), and cobalt (Co), comprising the rWNiCo mixture, demonstrated that each metal exhibited a similar pattern of gene induction, but at a significantly decreased magnitude than that of the rWNiCo mixture. These data showed a synergistic activation of gene expression by the metals in the rWNiCo mixture. Our data show for the first time that DU and rWNiCo can activate gene expression through several signal transduction pathways that may be
involved in the toxicity and tumorigenicity of both DU and HMTAs.

Transformation of Human Osteoblast Cells to the Tumorigenic Phenotype by Depleted Uranium-Uranyl Chloride

Depleted uranium (DU) is a dense heavy metal used primarily in military applications. Although the health effects of occupational uranium exposure are well known, limited data exist regarding the long-term health effects of internalized DU in humans. We established an in vitro cellular model to study DU exposure. Microdosimetric assessment, determined using a Monte Carlo computer simulation based on measured intracellular adn extracellular uranium levels, showed that few (0.0014%) cell nuclei were hit by alpha particles. We report the ability of DU-uranyl chloride to transform immortalized human osteoblastic cells (HOS) to the tumorigenic phenotype. DU-uranyl chloride-transformants are characterized by anchorage-indeendent growth, tumor formation in mice, expression of high levels of the k-ras oncogene, reduced production of the Rb tumor-suppressor protein, and elevated levels of sister chromatid exchanges per cell. DU-uranyl chloride treatment resulted in a 9.6 (± 2.8) -fold increase in transformation frequency compared to untreated cells. In comparison, nickel sulfate resulted in a 7.1 (± 2.1) -fold increase in transformation frequency. This is the first report showing that a DU compound caused human cell transformation to the neoplastic phenotype. Although additional studies are needed to determine if protracted DU exposure produces tumors in vivio, the implication from these in vitro results is that the risk of cancer induction from internalized DU exposure may be comparable to other biologically reactive and carcinogenic heavy-metal compounds (e.g., nickel). Environ Health Perspect 106:465-471 (1998). [Online 6 July 1998]

http://ehpnet1.niehs.nih.gov/docs/1998/106p465-471miller/abstract.html

Genomic instability in human osteoblast cells after exposure to depleted uranium: delayed lethality and micronuclei formation

It is known that radiation can induce a transmissible persistent destabilization of the genome. We have established an in vitro cellular model using HOS cells to investigate whether genomic instability plays a role in depleted uranium (DU)-induced effects. Transmissible genomic instability, manifested in the progeny of cells exposed to ionizing radiation, has been characterized by de novo chromosomal aberrations, gene mutations, and an enhanced death rate. Cell lethality and micronuclei formation were measured at various times after exposure to DU, Ni, or gamma radiation. Following a prompt, concentration-dependent acute response for both endpoints, there was de novo genomic instability in progeny cells. Delayed reproductive death was observed for many generations (36 days, 30 population doublings) following exposure to DU, Ni, or gamma radiation. While DU stimulated delayed production of micronuclei up to 36 days after exposure, levels in cells exposed to gamma-radiation or Ni returned to normal after 12 days. There was also a persistent increase in micronuclei in all clones isolated from cells that had been exposed to nontoxic concentrations of DU. While clones isolated from gamma-irradiated cells (at doses equitoxic to metal exposure) generally demonstrated an increase in micronuclei, most clonal progeny of Ni-exposed cells did not. These studies demonstrate that DU exposure in vitro results in genomic instability manifested as delayed reproductive death and micronuclei formation.
Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.

Leukemic transformation of hematopoietic cells in mice internally exposed to depleted uranium

Depleted uranium (DU) is a dense heavy metal used in military applications. During military conflicts, US military personnel have been wounded by DU shrapnel. The health effects of embedded DU are unknown. Published data from our laboratory demonstrated thatDUexposure in vitro can transform immortalized human osteoblast cells (HOS) to the tumorigenic phenotype. Results from our laboratory have also shown that DU is genotoxic and mutagenic in cultured human cells. Internalized DU could be a carcinogenic risk and concurrent alpha particle and heavy metal toxic effects complicate this potential risk. Anecdotal reports have suggested that DU can cause leukemia. To better assess this risk, we have developed an in vivo leukemogenesis model. This model involves using murine hematopoietic cells (FDC-P1) that are dependent on stimulation by granulocytemacrophage colony stimulating factor (GM-CSF) or interleukin 3 (IL-3) and injected into mice to produce myeloid leukemia. Although immortalized, these cells are not tumorigenic on subcutaneous inoculation in mice. Intravenous injection of FDC-P1 cells into DU-implanted DBA/2 mice was followed by the development of leukemias in 76% of all mice implanted with DU pellets. In contrast, only 12% of control mice developed leukemia. Karyotypic analysis confirmed that the leukemias originated from FDC-P1 cells. The growth properties of leukemic cells from bone marrow, spleen, and lymph node were assessed and indicate that the FDC-P1 cells had become transformed in vivo. The kidney, spleen, bone marrow, muscle, and urine showed significant elevations in tissue uranium levels prior to induction of leukemia. These results demonstrated that a DU altered in vivo environment may be involved in the pathogenesis of DU induced leukemia in an animal model. (Mol Cell Biochem 279: 97–104, 2005)

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Filed Under: Depleted Uranium Tagged With: uranium, weapon

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