The Response of Twenty-Seven Inbred Strains of Mice to Daily Doses of Whole-Body X-Irradiation

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Abstract
Males and females of 27 inbred strains were irradiated daily with 100 r of X-rays until death. Significant strain differences in survival time were observed. Heritability of survival under irradiation varied significantly with season, with a high value of +0.52 in the cooler months. Males survived 1.6 days longer than females under this dose schedule. Some of the strains studied were considerably more resistant to irradiation than others. The rank order of survival times of the strains agreed with published data on LD50, life span, and litter size, suggesting that radiation resistance is a good indicator of general fitness. Conversely, radiation resistance manifested by a genotype could be estimated by the manifestations of that genotype in other fitness traits.