New Mars Forums

Rxke

Member

From: Belgium

Registered: 2003-11-03

Posts: 3,669

Re: UV-A radiation harmful too - new findings

Hmmm...

turns out UV-A is at least as bad as UV-B in terms of risks of skin-cancer... How does this affect radiation-shielding of visors etc?

[http://www.news.com.au/common/story_pag … 02,00.html]news.com.au

BTW: baaaad news for the solar-bank (artificial-tanning) sellers and centers, they use UV-A tubes...

SBird

Banned

Registered: 2004-03-10

Posts: 490

Re: UV-A radiation harmful too - new findings

Personally, I'd like to see someone confirm these results.  Having longwave UV-A cause skin cancer is bizarre.  There's nothing for the UV to interact with at those wavelengths.  UV-A is defined as 320-400 nm.  The primary absorption peaks for DNA are at 280 nm and proteins absorb at 260 and 300 nm. 

Anyways, extending UV protection on a visor to go to 400 nm is trivial.  $10 blue-blocker sunglasses will do the trick just fine.