FLASH ultra-high dose rates in radiotherapy: preclinical and radiobiological evidence

Author(s):  
Andrea Borghini ◽  
Cecilia Vecoli ◽  
Luca Labate ◽  
Daniele Panetta ◽  
Maria Grazia Andreassi ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Author(s):  
M. Isaacson ◽  
M.L. Collins ◽  
M. Listvan

Over the past five years it has become evident that radiation damage provides the fundamental limit to the study of blomolecular structure by electron microscopy. In some special cases structural determinations at very low doses can be achieved through superposition techniques to study periodic (Unwin & Henderson, 1975) and nonperiodic (Saxton & Frank, 1977) specimens. In addition, protection methods such as glucose embedding (Unwin & Henderson, 1975) and maintenance of specimen hydration at low temperatures (Taylor & Glaeser, 1976) have also shown promise. Despite these successes, the basic nature of radiation damage in the electron microscope is far from clear. In general we cannot predict exactly how different structures will behave during electron Irradiation at high dose rates. Moreover, with the rapid rise of analytical electron microscopy over the last few years, nvicroscopists are becoming concerned with questions of compositional as well as structural integrity. It is important to measure changes in elemental composition arising from atom migration in or loss from the specimen as a result of electron bombardment.


Author(s):  
D.T. Grubb

Diffraction studies in polymeric and other beam sensitive materials may bring to mind the many experiments where diffracted intensity has been used as a measure of the electron dose required to destroy fine structure in the TEM. But this paper is concerned with a range of cases where the diffraction pattern itself contains the important information.In the first case, electron diffraction from paraffins, degraded polyethylene and polyethylene single crystals, all the samples are highly ordered, and their crystallographic structure is well known. The diffraction patterns fade on irradiation and may also change considerably in a-spacing, increasing the unit cell volume on irradiation. The effect is large and continuous far C94H190 paraffin and for PE, while for shorter chains to C 28H58 the change is less, levelling off at high dose, Fig.l. It is also found that the change in a-spacing increases at higher dose rates and at higher irradiation temperatures.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Konrad P. Nesteruk ◽  
Michele Togno ◽  
Martin Grossmann ◽  
Anthony J. Lomax ◽  
Damien C. Weber ◽  
...  

2020 ◽  
Vol 152 ◽  
pp. S353-S354
Author(s):  
E. Konradsson ◽  
M. Lempart ◽  
B. Blad ◽  
C. Ceberg ◽  
K. Petersson

1969 ◽  
Vol 42 (494) ◽  
pp. 102-107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger J. Berry ◽  
Eric J. Hall ◽  
David W. Forster ◽  
Thomas H. Storr ◽  
Michael J. Goodman
Keyword(s):  
X Rays ◽  

1991 ◽  
Vol 67 (5) ◽  
pp. 486-492
Author(s):  
Frank N. Dost

Prediction of potential harm, or risk assessment, is essential to planning for any vegetation management method, but the concepts and process are often not understood. This discussion is a highly simplistic description of the basic elements of toxicology and estimation of risk in excess of the high normal background. All chemical risk is directly related to the dose acquired by the subject or population. In the case of cancer, added human risk that may be associated with very low doses is expressed as a probability that is estimated by extrapolation from observations at high dose rates. Reasons for such an indirect approach and weaknesses of the present process are described.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (19) ◽  
pp. 4942
Author(s):  
Maria Grazia Ronga ◽  
Marco Cavallone ◽  
Annalisa Patriarca ◽  
Amelia Maia Leite ◽  
Pierre Loap ◽  
...  

The development of innovative approaches that would reduce the sensitivity of healthy tissues to irradiation while maintaining the efficacy of the treatment on the tumor is of crucial importance for the progress of the efficacy of radiotherapy. Recent methodological developments and innovations, such as scanned beams, ultra-high dose rates, and very high-energy electrons, which may be simultaneously available on new accelerators, would allow for possible radiobiological advantages of very short pulses of ultra-high dose rate (FLASH) therapy for radiation therapy to be considered. In particular, very high-energy electron (VHEE) radiotherapy, in the energy range of 100 to 250 MeV, first proposed in the 2000s, would be particularly interesting both from a ballistic and biological point of view for the establishment of this new type of irradiation technique. In this review, we examine and summarize the current knowledge on VHEE radiotherapy and provide a synthesis of the studies that have been published on various experimental and simulation works. We will also consider the potential for VHEE therapy to be translated into clinical contexts.


The electron beam generated by a 15 MeV linear accelerator has been employed to induce reactions in aerated aqueous solutions of 1 to 25 mM ferrous sulphate, and of 0⋅1 to 1 mM ceric sulphate. The radiation was delivered in pulses of 1⋅3 μ s duration and over a range of dose rates from 0⋅5 to 20000 rads/pulse. Radiation yields at constant dose rate were compared with the aid of a chemical dose monitor. A system of two thin, widely spaced, irradiation vessels was employed to determine the variation of yield of any one system over successive known ranges of dose rate. The yield of ferric sulphate in the iron system was found to decrease with increasing dose rate in the range 0⋅01 to 10 krads/pulse by an overall factor of 0⋅85, and was appreciably dependent on the initial concentrations of dissolved oxygen and of ferrous sulphate at high dose rates. Yields of hydrogen and of hydrogen peroxide were practically independent of dose rate. The observations have been interpreted on the basis of inter-radical reactions which occur when the reaction zones of neighbouring clusters overlap. The following reactions can account for all the data: OH + Fe 2+ → Fe 3+ + OH ¯ , (1) H + O 2 → HO 2 , (2) H + OH → H 2 O. (7) The values k 1 / k 7 = 0⋅0062, and k 2 / k 7 = 0⋅22 are reasonably consistent with the observations. In the ceric sulphate system the yield of cerous sulphate increases progressively over the range 0⋅01 to 10 krads/pulse by an overall factor of 1⋅4. The data accord with the view that at high dose rates OH radicals react with them selves ultimately to form hydrogen peroxide, in competition with their normal reaction with cerous sulphate.


2020 ◽  
Vol 93 (1106) ◽  
pp. 20190702 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriel Adrian ◽  
Elise Konradsson ◽  
Michael Lempart ◽  
Sven Bäck ◽  
Crister Ceberg ◽  
...  

Objective: Recent in vivo results have shown prominent tissue sparing effect of radiotherapy with ultra-high dose rates (FLASH) compared to conventional dose rates (CONV). Oxygen depletion has been proposed as the underlying mechanism, but in vitro data to support this have been lacking. The aim of the current study was to compare FLASH to CONV irradiation under different oxygen concentrations in vitro. Methods: Prostate cancer cells were irradiated at different oxygen concentrations (relative partial pressure ranging between 1.6 and 20%) with a 10 MeV electron beam at a dose rate of either 600 Gy/s (FLASH) or 14 Gy/min (CONV), using a modified clinical linear accelerator. We evaluated the surviving fraction of cells using clonogenic assays after irradiation with doses ranging from 0 to 25 Gy. Results: Under normoxic conditions, no differences between FLASH and CONV irradiation were found. For hypoxic cells (1.6%), the radiation response was similar up to a dose of about 5–10 Gy, above which increased survival was shown for FLASH compared to CONV irradiation. The increased survival was shown to be significant at 18 Gy, and the effect was shown to depend on oxygen concentration. Conclusion: The in vitro FLASH effect depends on oxygen concentration. Further studies to characterize and optimize the use of FLASH in order to widen the therapeutic window are indicated. Advances in knowledge: This paper shows in vitro evidence for the role of oxygen concentration underlying the difference between FLASH and CONV irradiation.


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