Radiobiology Flashcards
Roughly how many SSBs and DSBs occur per Gy of radiation?
SSB 1000
DSBs 40
What are hierarchical tissues?
Have populations of stem cells, transit (maturing partially differentiated) and functionally fully differentiated cells.
Acute toxicity after radiation
What are flexible tissues?
Cells rarely divide but may be induced to by damage. Cells are functional but retain ability to re-enter cell cycle.
Respond more slowly to radiation
Name some F-type tissues (flexible)?
Liver
Thyroid
Dermis of skin
What is serial behaviour of an organ? Name some serial organs.
Small critical functioning volume
Susceptible to high point doses
Spinal cord, brainstem, optic nerve, bowel
What is parallel behaviour of an organ? Name some parallel organs
Large critical functioning volume
Each functional subunit is able to function independently
More susceptible to volume effects
Lung (can be both), kidney, liver
What is the equivalent uniform dose?
EUD is the absorbed radiation dose which when given homogeneously to a tumour results in the same degree of clonogen cell kill as a non-homogenous dose.
Reflects the overall cell kill produced by a nonuniform dose distribution and so potentially a better indicator of biological outcome than simple average physical dose.
The normal tissue complication probability is a function of…
1, FSU inactivation probability
- Number of FSUs
- Doses received by the FSUs
- Assumed hierarchial structure (serial, parallel)
- Minimum numbers of FSUs to remain intact to ensure functionality
- Consequential functional links between groups of FSUs
How is the generalised EUD calculated?
Equation which uses a biological parameter “a” which is derived from clinical observation and chosen to reflect the desired radiobiological property.
a <1 = lower doses are given higher weight so that the cold spots influence EUD to a larger extent. Useful if cold spots on target
a =1 : cold and hot spots given equal value - good for parallel organs.
a >1 : larger doses are given higher weight so that hot spots influence the EUD to a larger extent- good for serial organs.
What is a clonogenic tumour cell?
Has the capacity to generate a new tumour
Requires viability AND capacity for sustained cell division
Cells that form colonies exceeding 50 cells (5-6 generations) - this excludes cells with limited growth potential.
When do cells lose their reproductive ability after radiation?
Cells do not die immediately after dose of radiation. Some undergo division before dying but the loss of reproductive integrity that is thought to be the critical response to radiotherapy occurs within a few hours
Some clonogenic normal tissue cells can regenerate.
What is a clonogenic assay?
Used to assess the response of cells to ionising radiation. They may be used to assess cell survival following radiation by measuring colony formation after a particular dose. Several types of assay exist. A control assay, where no radiation is given, must be used to determine the efficacy of the test and adjust the observed outcome. This is known (for in vitro colony assays) as plating effectiveness.
Name some types of clonogenic assay?
In vitro - plates
Spleen colony assays
- If bone marrow cells are injected into a synergistic mouse recipient, colonies in the spleen will form from the surviving stem cells. The number of colonies can be counted to assess cell survival of bone marrow cells following irradiation. This technique is also used for some types of mouse lymphoma cells.
Lung colony assays
This is similar to a spleen colony assay. Transplanted mouse tumours will often grow more readily in the lung and the number of colonies that form on the lung surface is related to the number of surviving tumour cells.
Limiting dilution assays
Different sizes of tumour colonies may be inoculated into the subcutaneous tissue of a creature (usually a mouse). The number and size of colonies which grow is then observed. By taking into account the size of the inoculated tumour colony, highly accurate readings of cell survival can be obtained (down to 1 x 10-6 surviving cells)
If you have a single suspension of tumour cells and split them into 2 parts, one was irradiated and one was not.
They are then plated out.
Plate 1: 100 control cells -> 20 control colonies
Plate 2: 400 irradiated cells -> 8 irradiated colonies
What is the plating efficiency and surviving fraction?
Plate 1: efficiency = 20/100 = 0.2
Plate 2 efficiency = 8/400 = 0.02
Surviving fraction = plating efficiency treated/plating efficiency of control = 0.02/0.2 = 0.1 = 10%
After treatment a linear survival curve would have what shape?
Sigmoig shape
A logirithmic survival curve would have what kind of shape?
Has a shoulder at top then exponential decrease
What is the LD50?
Lethal dose that kills 50%
What is the TGTv5?
Time it takes for tumour to get to 5 x treatment volume
How do you calculate the tumour growth delay?
Tumour growth treated minus tumour growth of control
What is linear energy transfer?
The density of ionisation in particle tracks.
LET is the average energy (in KeV) given up by a charged particle traversing a distance of 1 micrometre.
What type of radiation has a high LET?
Alpha particles
What types of radiation has a low LET?
XR, gamma rays, protons (most of the time)
How does low LET Radiation cause damage?
1/3 direct DNA damage
2/3 indirect damage - ROS
Is low or high LET radiaiton more likely to cause cancer?
Low LET
Causes more mutations in surviving cells due to indirect damage and these can go on to form cancer.
High LET radiation more likely to kill cell then cause mutation in a surviving cell
As LET increases how does the survival curve change
Steeper without a shoulder
As LET increases what happens to the RBE?
RBE rises with increasing LET up to a certain point.
At very high values of LET you get overkill.
Very high LET radiation is inefficient as it deposits more energy per cell and so produces more DSBs per cell than is needed to kill it, so has less energy to kill other cells.
What is the optimum LET for cell kill?
Around 100kev/micrometre
As LET increases what happens to the OER?
Decreases as less depedend on oxygen.
What is the RBE?
Ratio of effectiveness of one type of ionising radiation relative to antoher given the same amount of energy is absorbed.
What is RBE measured in?
Sieverts
How do you calculate relative biological effectiveness?
Dx/Dr
Dx = reference absorbed dose of radiation of standard type X Dr = absorbed dose of radiation of type R that causes the same biological effect
What is the equivalent dose?
Measured in Sieverts
Takes into account the radiation weighting factor
Radiation weighting factor = 1 for xrs, gamma rays, beta
= 20 for alpha particles.
1Gy of XRs = 1 Sv
1Gy of alpha particles = 20 Sv
What is the effective dose?
Measured in Sieverts
Takes into account the radiation weighting factor + tissue weighting factor
What does alpha tell us on linear quadratic model?
Indicates sensitivity to low doses of radiation
What does beta on LQ model tell us?
Indicates sensitivity to high doses of radiation
What does the alpha/beta ratio tell us? Is it a marker of radiosensitivity?
does NOT relate to radiosensitivity
Indicates the sensitivity to changes in dose per fraction
Determines the bendiness of the survival cruve
Would a radiosensitiser affect the alpha/beta ratio?
No not the ratio but it would affect the alpha and beta seperately
If a cell has a low alpha/beta ratio, is it sensitve to dose per fraction?
Very sensitive to dose per fraction
Some tumours, notably prostate cancer and melanoma, have low α/β values. This makes them more sensitive to large fraction sizes and resistant to small fraction sizes
If a cell has a high alpha/beta ratio is it sensitive to dose per fraction?
No
What is the alpha/beta ratio of H+N, breast and prostate cancer?
H+N = 10
Breast = 4.5
Prostate =1.5
What is the alpha/beta ratio of spinal cord/brain/lens, skin, and other late organs?
Spinal cord/brain and lens = 2
Skin = 10 acute, 3 late
Other late organs = 3
According to the LQ model what is the effect of radiation proportional to ?
αD + βD^2
What is the mean inactivation dose?
An estimate of the average radiation dose to inactive a cell. Calculated as the area under the survival curve (survival probability).
If you reduce the overall treatment time then what happens to acute tox, late tox and tumour control?
Acute tox: worse
Late tox: same
Tumour control: better
If you give more fractions with same dose and treatment time then what happens to acute tox, late tox and tumour control??
Acute tox: same
Late tox: better
Tumour control: same
If you increase the total dose then what happens to acute tox, late tox and tumour control?
Acute tox: worse
Late tox: worse
Tumour control: better
If you treat 2 x a day then what happens to acute tox, late tox and tumour control?
Acute tox: same/worse (needs 6hrs between)
Late tox: worse - due to repair
Tumour control: same /better
What happens to cells during acute toxicity after radiotherapy?
Differentiated cells - cell depletion, hypoplasia, desquamation
Vascular endothelium- increase permeability, oedema, erythema
Mediated by cytokines - paracrine signalling.
- IL1, IL6,
- TNF-alpha- promotes apoptosis
Healing of depleted mature cells via migration of stem cells from outside the area and division of surviving stem cells.
How long does repair take in late responding tissues?
Longer than acute responding