The absorbed dose is the average energy absorbed per unit mass.

The tissue absorbed energy in a small mass volume:
D = (dW/dm) [ Gy ]
D = absorbed dose in Gray (Gy); dW = in the tissue energy absorbed; DM = small volume of the mass.

The SI unit of absorbed dose is the joule per kilogram and its special name is the gray (Gy). In units often used by federal and state agencies, absorbed dose is given in rad; 1 rad = 0.01 Gy.

Absorbed dose is a feature that should increase dose awareness and help users in dose optimization. Absorbed dose in CT is quoted using the CTDI (computed tomography dose index)

CTDIvol (volume-averaged CT dose index) and the dose-length product (DLP) give an indication of the average absorbed dose and relative radiation risk to a standard patient. The user is being warned to scan parameter settings that may lead to high doses, and can adjust the protocol if appropriate. It should be noted that CTDIvol and DLP do not take patient size into account, and will give overestimates and underestimates for large and small patients, respectively.

The absorbed dose rate is the admitted dose per time unit.

See Absorbed Dose.

(rad) One rad is the absorbed radiation dose of 100 ergs of energy by one gram or 0.01 joules of energy by one kilogram of matter. In the SI system of units, the rad is replaced by the gray (Gy). 1 Gy = 100 rad. See also Absorbed Dose Rate.

(rem) The rem is the dose equivalent of the absorbed dose considering the biological efficiency of the radiation, also called quality factor. With a quality factor of 1 is 1 rem equal to 1.07185 roentgens. One millirem is one thousandth of one rem.
In the SI system of units the rem is replaced by the sievert (Sv), which is numerically equal to the absorbed dose in gray modified by a radiation weighting factor. The conversion factor has been readjusted from 1 to 1.07185 so that 100 rem are equal to 1 Sv.

Air KERMA (Kinetic Energy Released per unit MAss of air) measures the amount of radiation energy in air, unit is J/kg. This include the initial kinetic energy of the primary ionizing particles such as photoelectrons, Compton electrons, positron//negatron pairs from photon radiation, and scattered nuclei from fast neutrons, when for example air is irradiated by an x-ray beam. J/kg (gray) is also the unit of the radiation quantity 'Absorbed Dose'.