Irradiation of 3D cell models at ultra-high dose rates

  • Aaron McMurray

Student thesis: Doctoral ThesisDoctor of Philosophy

Abstract

High power lasers offer new research opportunities in largely unexplored areas of ultra-high dose rate radiobiology. The short burst nature of laser accelerated protons and heavier ions makes possible the irradiation of cells at dose rates which can exceed 10^9 Gy/s. It is necessary to assess the biological responses of cells to these ultra-high dose rates if laser driven ion acceleration is to be of future biomedical use. It is the aim of this project to undertake such an assessment by means of highlighting differences in biological responses which arise as a result of laser driven ion acceleration. Previous work in this area has focused on planar cell models which do not accurately represent the in vivo environment in which tumours develop in a number of key areas such as cell signalling, nutrient and metabolite gradients, differentiation, proliferation and hypoxic conditions. By utilising 3D cell culture techniques the physiological relevance of pre-clinical models is improved which may be of importance in determining differences in the physiological responses of cells to irradiation via laser driven ion acceleration
Date of AwardJul 2023
Original languageEnglish
Awarding Institution
  • Queen's University Belfast
SponsorsNorthern Ireland Department for the Economy
SupervisorKevin Prise (Supervisor), Marco Borghesi (Supervisor) & Jonathan Coulter (Supervisor)

Keywords

  • laser driven ion acceleration
  • 3D cell culture
  • ultra-high dose-rate
  • FLASH-RT
  • glioblastoma
  • hypoxia

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