Abstract
Tissue reactions and stochastic effects after exposure to ionising radiation are variable between individuals but the factors and mechanisms governing individual responses are not well understood. Individual responses can be measured at different levels of biological organization and using different endpoints following varying doses of radiation, including: cancers, non-cancer diseases and mortality in the whole organism; normal tissue reactions after exposures; and, cellular endpoints such as chromosomal damage and molecular alterations. There is no doubt that many factors influence the responses of people to radiation to different degrees. In addition to the obvious general factors of radiation quality, dose, dose rate and the tissue (sub)volume irradiated, recognized and potential determining factors include age, sex, life style (e.g., smoking, diet, possibly body mass index), environmental factors, genetics and epigenetics, stochastic distribution of cellular events, and systemic comorbidities such as diabetes or viral infections. Genetic factors are commonly thought to be a substantial contributor to individual response to radiation. Apart from a small number of rare monogenic diseases such as ataxia telangiectasia, the inheritance of an abnormally responsive phenotype among a population of healthy individuals does not follow a classical Mendelian inheritance pattern. Rather it is considered to be a multi-factorial, complex trait.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 185-209 |
Number of pages | 25 |
Journal | Radiation and Environmental Biophysics |
Volume | 59 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 1 May 2020 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:The workshop participants and members of ICRP Task Group 111 thank Christopher Clement, the ICRP Scientific Secretary for his support and participation at these workshops and his review and comments on this article. The Radiation Effects Research Foundation (RERF), Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan is a public interest foundation funded by the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW) and the US Department of Energy (DOE). The research was also funded in part through DOE award DE-HS0000031 to the National Academy of Sciences and contract HHSN261201400009C through the U. S. National Cancer Institute (NCI). The views of the authors do not necessarily reflect those of the two governments. The study by A Sadakane is based on a collaboration with researchers outside RERF, Dr. Shuji Yonehara of JA Onomichi General Hospital, Dr. Takashi Nishisaka of Hiroshima Prefectural Hospital, Dr. Masahiro Nakashima of Nagasaki University, Dr. Dale L. Preston of HiroSoft International Corporation, and Dr. Kiyohiko Mabuchi, Dr. Xiaohong R. Yang, and Dr. Amy Berrington de Gonzalez of the US National Cancer Institute. This study is supported by the contract with US NCI (HHSN261201400009C) and by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number JP23590839, in addition to the usual funds from Japanese and US governments.
Keywords
- Animal models
- Cancer
- Genetics
- ICRP
- Individual variation
- Modifiable risk factors
- Radiation risk
- Radiation sensitivity
- Tissue reactions
- epigenetics