Publikationsrepositorium - Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf

The development of proton and ion acceleration by ultra-high intensity lasers for cancer therapy promises the realization of compact and economic particle accelerators that can be integrated in already existing clinics. However, particle acceleration with high intensity lasers, in comparison to the conventional used acceleration technique, leads to ultra-short beam pulses, generated with low pulse frequency, that apply a very high pulse dose. Prior to a clinical application the radiobiological consequences of laser accelerated and therewith ultra-short pulsed particle beams have to be investigated.
After extensive in vitro dose response studies, for several cell lines and endpoints with laser driven electron and proton beams, the translational step to perform in vivo experiments has been taken. A tumor model suitable for currently available low energy laser protons was developed, tested and successfully used. The already in vitro established laser based irradiation technology was further developed for the animal model in terms of beam transport, beam monitoring, dose delivery and dosimetry, allowing to apply a prescribed dose to each tumor and to determine the absolute dose received. The utilized high power laser system delivered a stable and reproducible particle beam over a period of months to allow systematic in vivo dose response studies of a human xenograft line. 300 mice hosting two different tumor lines were irradiated with various defined doses and monitored for several weeks to determine tumor growth delay.
In parallel irradiation by a continuous beam of a conventional accelerator has been performed. Results of the still ongoing data evaluation will be presented and discussed.

Experiments were carried out within the onCOOPtics project in cooperation between Oncoray Dresden and Ultraoptics Jena. The work was supported by the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), grant no. 03ZIK445