Using FLUKA and BIANCA for preliminary radiobiological studies

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In December 2018 OMA Fellow Giulia Arico’ visited the research group led by Prof. Francesca Ballarini at the University of Pavia. The research group is developing a new radiobiological model, called BIANCA (Biophysical ANalysis of Cell death and chromosome Aberrations). In comparison to other model used in clinics in Germany (HIT and MIT facilities) and Italy (CNAO), BIANCA links the probability of cell death directly to the chromosome aberrations, which are also indicators of normal tissue damage.

During the visit in Pavia, Giulia Arico’ together with her colleagues, performed preliminary comparisons of the cell death probability predicted by BIANCA and LEM I. Irradiation of different cell lines, like Chinese hamster V79 and Chinese hamster ovary cells, have been simulated using the FLUKA code. Figure 1 shows an example of V79 cells irradiated with two opposite carbon ion fields, delivering a relative dose of ~0.45 Gy at the entrance channel, and producing a spread-out Bragg peak (SOBP) between 10 and 15 cm in water with a relative dose level of ~1.25 Gy.

The results indicated that with respect to LEM I, BIANCA predicts a lower cell death probability in the plateau area and a higher cell death probability at the SOBP, and in particular close to the SOBP edges. The probability of chromosome aberrations has been calculated with BIANCA and is also shown in the image below. This research is promising in order to provide additional information to those achievable using the LEM I model and could contribute to the improvement of the accuracy of the treatment planning for cancer patients treated with hadron therapy.

Two opposite carbon ion fields are used to irradiate Chinese hamster V79 cells. The purple curve shows the delivered dose in Gy. The dark blue line shows the cell death probability predicted by the LEM I model. The yellow line and the light blue line show the cell death probability and the chromosome aberration probability predicted by the BIANCA model, respectively.