Whole Abdominal Pencil Beam Scanned Proton FLASH Increases Acute Lethality.

ABSTRACT:

Purpose

Ultrahigh dose-rate FLASH radiation therapy has emerged as a modality that promises to reduce normal tissue toxicity while maintaining tumor control. Previous studies of gastrointestinal toxicity using passively scattered FLASH proton therapy (PRT) have, however, yielded mixed results, suggesting that the requirements for gastrointestinal sparing by FLASH are an open question. Furthermore, the more clinically relevant pencil beam scanned (PBS) FLASH PRT has not yet been assessed in this context, despite differences in the spatiotemporal dose-rate distributions compared with passively scattered PRT. Here, to our knowledge, we provide the first report on the effects of PBS FLASH PRT on acute gastrointestinal injury in mice after whole abdominal irradiation.

Methods and mat

SUBMITTER: Bell BI 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12142639 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature