The year 2016 marks the 100th Year Anniversary milestone of radiological research at Columbia University. In 1916 Gioacchino Failla was appointed to operate the radon plant at Memorial Hospital in New York and set up the Biophysical Laboratory, which was later moved to Columbia University and named the Radiological Research Laboratory. Subsequently, it was renamed the Center for Radiological Research (CRR). The year 2017 also marks the 50th anniversary of the Radiological Research Accelerator Facilities (RARAF), home of the renowned Columbia University charged particle microbeam. To help celebrate these historical events, the Guest Editors and Faculty of the Center for Radiological Research are pleased to present to readers of Radiation Research a Centennial Special Issue to commemorate the occasion and to highlight some of the current research conducted by members of the Center.

The review by Eric Hall on the first 100 years of the CRR brought back memories of some of the pioneers in radiological sciences, Henry Janeway, Gioacchino Failla, Edith Quimby, Titus Evans, Harold Rossi, Albrecht Kellerer, Ruth Hill and Roberts Rugh, to name a few. The historical background and the move of RARAF from the Brookhaven National Laboratory to the Columbia University Nevis Laboratories described by Steve Marino, manager of the facilities for more than 3 decades, was informative. A series of nine other contributions from members of the CRR provide a glimpse of the diverse research interests and current focus of the Center.

The mission of the CRR over the past decade has not changed, namely to foster a multi- disciplinary approach towards understanding the biological and human health consequences of ionizing radiation exposure; to train the next generation of radiological scientists and, finally, to provide an unbiased, comprehensive, independent source of scientific information on radiation exposure for the government, policy makers and the general public.

In an era where the word “radiation” arouses unease among the public, particularly after the Fukushima Daiichi reactor incident in Japan, and controversies about the human health risks after exposure to low doses of radiation, it is ever more important that radiological sciences be supported. In this regard, the CRR is making its contribution to our community in no small way for the past century.