Cancer radiotherapy based on femtosecond IR laser-beam filamentation yielding ultra-high dose rates and zero entrance dose.

ABSTRACT: Since the invention of cancer radiotherapy, its primary goal has been to maximize lethal radiation doses to the tumor volume while keeping the dose to surrounding healthy tissues at zero. Sadly, conventional radiation sources (γ or X rays, electrons) used for decades, including multiple or modulated beams, inevitably deposit the majority of their dose in front or behind the tumor, thus damaging healthy tissue and causing secondary cancers years after treatment. Even the most recent pioneering advances in costly proton or carbon ion therapies can not completely avoid dose buildup in front of the tumor volume. Here we show that this ultimate goal of radiotherapy is yet within our reach: Using intense ultra-short infrared laser pulses we can now deposit a very large energy dose at unprecedent

SUBMITTER: Meesat R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3458390 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature