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Fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: Lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway

Bullet fragments have been previously observed in the remains and edible portions of big game animals that were harvested using rifles. The fragmentation issue has attracted attention because traditional hunting bullets are more than 70% lead, which is toxic to humans and scavengers in the ecosystem...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Leontowich, Adam F. G., Panahifar, Arash, Ostrowski, Ryan
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9401160/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36001533
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0271987
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author Leontowich, Adam F. G.
Panahifar, Arash
Ostrowski, Ryan
author_facet Leontowich, Adam F. G.
Panahifar, Arash
Ostrowski, Ryan
author_sort Leontowich, Adam F. G.
collection PubMed
description Bullet fragments have been previously observed in the remains and edible portions of big game animals that were harvested using rifles. The fragmentation issue has attracted attention because traditional hunting bullets are more than 70% lead, which is toxic to humans and scavengers in the ecosystem. We prepared gunshot wounds in ballistic gelatin blocks, and then applied synchrotron X-ray imaging technology to the bullet fragmentation process for the first time. The K edge subtraction (KES) imaging method allowed a clear separation of lead in an image from false positives, including the other major bullet component, copper, and non-lead objects such as bone fragments. The superior brightness of synchrotron radiation was also harnessed to resolve thousands of embedded sub-10 μm fragments, a size range not previously observed using commonly applied X-ray imaging modalities. The results challenge the current understanding of the maximum extent that fragments may be distributed, and the effectiveness of imaging methods used to screen wild game donations at food banks for lead bullet fragments.
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spelling pubmed-94011602022-08-25 Fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: Lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway Leontowich, Adam F. G. Panahifar, Arash Ostrowski, Ryan PLoS One Research Article Bullet fragments have been previously observed in the remains and edible portions of big game animals that were harvested using rifles. The fragmentation issue has attracted attention because traditional hunting bullets are more than 70% lead, which is toxic to humans and scavengers in the ecosystem. We prepared gunshot wounds in ballistic gelatin blocks, and then applied synchrotron X-ray imaging technology to the bullet fragmentation process for the first time. The K edge subtraction (KES) imaging method allowed a clear separation of lead in an image from false positives, including the other major bullet component, copper, and non-lead objects such as bone fragments. The superior brightness of synchrotron radiation was also harnessed to resolve thousands of embedded sub-10 μm fragments, a size range not previously observed using commonly applied X-ray imaging modalities. The results challenge the current understanding of the maximum extent that fragments may be distributed, and the effectiveness of imaging methods used to screen wild game donations at food banks for lead bullet fragments. Public Library of Science 2022-08-24 /pmc/articles/PMC9401160/ /pubmed/36001533 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0271987 Text en © 2022 Leontowich et al https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Leontowich, Adam F. G.
Panahifar, Arash
Ostrowski, Ryan
Fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: Lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway
title Fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: Lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway
title_full Fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: Lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway
title_fullStr Fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: Lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway
title_full_unstemmed Fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: Lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway
title_short Fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: Lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway
title_sort fragmentation of hunting bullets observed with synchrotron radiation: lighting up the source of a lesser-known lead exposure pathway
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9401160/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36001533
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0271987
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