Chinese Scientists Reveal Key Mechanism Behind Heavy-Ion Cancer Therapy

Beijing, 17 Mar (ONA) --- A recent study, led by researchers from the Institute of Modern Physics (IMP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and their collaborators, has made significant progress in uncovering the microscopic mechanism behind heavy-ion cancer therapy, which is expected to optimize cancer treatment strategies and promote the development of new radiotherapy technologies.

The findings were recently published as a highlighted paper in the journal Physical Review X. Heavy-ion therapy, which is a cutting-edge radiotherapy technique, uses heavy-ion beams to destroy cancer cells.

In this context, Xu Shenyue, a researcher with the IMP, explained that, "Under the same radiation dose, heavy ions exhibit two to three times greater cancer-cell-killing efficiency than traditional X-ray radiotherapy." "Heavy ions can be more efficiently cause DNA double-strand breaks in tumor cells, resulting in stronger biological effects. But the specific microscopic mechanism underlying these effects had long been unclear," Xu added.

Researchers conducted experiments at the heavy-ion research facilities in Lanzhou, northwest China's Gansu Province, to address this question. For the first time, they observed an inter-molecular energy and proton transfer cascade mechanism triggered by heavy-ion irradiation in biomolecular clusters.

--- Ends/Khalid