Radiobiology of normal rat lung in Boron Neutron Capture Therapy

Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT) is a binary cancer radiation therapy that utilizes biochemical tumor cell targeting and provides a mixed field of high and low Linear Energy Transfer (LET) radiation with differing biological effectiveness. This project investigated the radiobiology of normal rat lung in BNCT and measured the relative biological effectiveness factors for the lung. Rat thorax irradiations were carried out with x-rays and neutrons with or without the boron compound boronophenylalanine-fructose (BPA-F). Monte Carlo radiation transport simulations were used to design the rat lung neutron irradiations. Among the neutron beam facilities available for BNCT at the MIT Research Reactor, the thermal neutron beam facility was found to provide a suitable dose distribution for this project. A delimiter was designed and constructed for the rat lung irradiations as a lithiated-polyethylene plate of 1.5 cm thickness with an aperture tapered from 4 to 3 cm in width to expose the lung to the beam and shield adjacent radiosensitive organs. The simulation design was validated with in-phantom measurements using gold foil activation and the dual ion chamber technique. By using a two-field irradiation, a relatively uniform dose distribution could be delivered to the rat lung. The mean lung dose rate was 18.7 cGy/min for neutron beam only irradiation and 37.5 cGy/min with neutrons plus BPA and a blood boron concentration of 18 gg/g.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Nuclear Science and Engineering.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2006

Author dc:creator

• Kiger, Jingli Liu

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Jeffrey A. Coderre.

• Nuclear Science and Engineering.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/41286

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/41286