UV index and UV dose: action spectra
data version 2.x

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UV radiation
monitoring:
UV index
UV dose
Main data product description page
 

Action spectra

An action spectrum describes the wavelength dependent response to radiation of a certain biological effect. The following graph shows the three action spectra including in v2.x of the TEMIS UV data products; for references see the end if this page.


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As the graph shows, the erythemal action spectrum covers both UV-A and UV-B radiation, while the vitamin-D action spectrum refers mostly to UV-B and the DNA-damage action spectrum to even shorter wavelength, i.e. harder, UV-B. (UV-C radiation does not reach the Earth's surface.) Note that the DNA-damage action spectrum does not refer to damage of dana DNA in the human skin, but rather to "naked DNA".

Relevant for the biological effect of UV radiation is the UV spectrum at the Earths surface weighted by the action spectrum. How this "weighted UV spectrum" is used to determine the the UV index and UV dose is described on a separate page.

 

References:

Erythemal action spectrum (CIE-98)
The CIE 1998 standard action spectrum: Joint ISO/CIE standard, ISO 17166/CIE S007/E-1999 (1999); this an update of the McKinlay and Diffey (1987) spectrum.
See for description and discussion:
  • Webb, A.R., Slaper, H., Koepke, P. and Schmalwieser, A.W.: 2011, "Know your standard: Clarifying the CIE erythema action spectrum." Photochem. Photobiol 87, 483--486. doi:10.1111/j.1751-1097.2010.00871.x
  • McKinlay, A. and Diffey, B.: 1987, "A reference action spectrum for ultraviolet induced erythema in human skin," CIE J 6, 17--22.
Vitamin-D acrion spectrum (CIE-174)
The action spectrum for the production of previtamin D3 in the human skin described by Bouillon et al. (2006), which was adopted by the CIE in 2006 as standard (CIE-174); this is an update of a draft version described by Holick et al. (2005).
See for description and discussion:
  • Bouillon, R., Eisman, J., Garabedian, M., Holick, M., Kleinschmidt, J., Suda, T., Terenetskaya, I., and Webb, A.: 2006, "Action spectrum for the production of previtamin D3 in human skin," UDC, 612, 481--506.
  • Holick, M., Bouillon, R., Eisman, J., Garabedian, M., Kleinschmidt, J., Suda, T., Terenetskaya, I., and Webb, A.: 2005, "Action spectrum for production of previtamin D3 in human skin," Tech. Rep. final draft report of September 2005, CIE Technical Committee 6-54, 2005.
DNA-damage action spectrum
The generalized DNA-damage UV dose is based on the action spectrum determined by Setlow (1974) and normalized at 300 nm based on Bernhard and Seckmeyer (1997).
See for description and discussion:
  • Setlow, R. B.: 1974, "The wavelengths in sunlight effective in producing skin cancer: a theoretical analysis," P. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 71, 3363--3366.
  • Bernhard, G. and Seckmeyer, G.: 1997, "Measurements of spectral solar UV irradiance in tropical Australia," J. Geophys. Res. 102, 8719--8730. doi:10.1029/97JD00072

 

last modified: 3 December 2020
data product contact: Jos van Geffen & Michiel van Weele & Ronald van der A
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