The following is an excerpt from the book Zapped! Irradiation and the Death of Food by Wenonah Hauter (Food & Water Watch, 2008). Over the decades, the effects of irradiation have been compared dismissively to sunlight and glibly to atomic bombs — and many images in between. Few grasp it completely, one of many reasons for its obscurity. Though the issue is kaleidoscopic, one needn’t be an expert in physics or food science to gain a basic understanding. Knowing what irradiation isn’t is just as important as knowing what it is, if not more so. Irradiated foods don’t glow in the dark. It doesn’t make food measurably radioactive, though a mind-boggling FDA ruling could change this by dramatically increasing the maximum allowable radiation dose. And you won’t sprout a sixth finger if you eat the stuff. Now for what irradiation is. It uses astronomically powerful blasts of X-rays, electron beams, and gamma rays to kill bacteria, to extend shelf life of food by delaying ripening and spoiling, and to eradicate fruit flies and other invasive pests. Here’s where a little chemistry and physics come in. This radiation is ionizing, meaning it has enough energy to blow […]