X-rays: not just for bags

It seems frequent flyers now have something else to worry about besides fistfights and lost luggage. According to researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder, exposure to radiation particles from space is expected to increase in the next few years as solar activity decreases.

Radiation exposure is greater over long flights, particularly over the poles, amounting to the equivalent of one chest X-ray for a typical flight from Chicago to Beijing. But too much in-flight radiation can break DNA strands and alter cell function, increasing cancer risk, CU Professor Delores Knipp, who authored the study, wrote in the journal Space Weather.

The article was spurred by a looming quiet period in the sun’s 22-year cycle known as the solar minimum, which is expected to allow radiation easier access to Earth. When cosmic rays enter Earth’s atmosphere and penetrate aircraft hulls, they scatter, which may cause “particle showers.”

Knipp said a study by researchers in Japan show cosmic ray fluxes during the upcoming solar minimum will likely be at their highest since the dawn of the aviation age.