Medical Radiology and Radiation Safety. 2025. Vol. 70. № 1
DOI:10.33266/1024-6177-2025-70-1-16-20
S.S. Sorokina1, V.A. Pikalov2, N.R. Popova1
The Behavioral Effect of Low Dose Carbon Ions Irradiation on Mice in Short-Term Period
1 Institute of Theoretical and Experimental Biophysics, Pushchino, Russia
2 A.A. Logunov Institute of High Energy Physics, Protvino, Russia
Contact person: N.R. Popova, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
ABSTRACT
The active introduction of ion therapy for the treatment of oncological diseases, as well as long-term plans for the exploration of deep space, where crews will be exposed to galactic radiation, the spectrum of which is dominated by protons and high-energy ions - carbon and iron, urgently pose the task of assessing the effect of ions on cognitive functions in order to increase the effectiveness of radiotherapy and ensure the safety of space flights.
Purpose: To study the effect of a therapeutic beam of carbon ions with an energy of 450 MeV/n at the Bragg peak at a dose of 0.7 Gy on the behavior of laboratory mice in the early period after irradiation.
Material and methods: Experiments were carried out on 2-month-old male mice of the SHK (28–32 g.). Before irradiation, the animals were placed on a platform in special containers. Irradiation with a uniform beam of carbon ions with an energy of 450 MeV/n in the Bragg peak at a dose of 0.7 Gy, formed by a “wobbler” magnet, was carried out in the U-70 RBS Collective Use Center (Protvino). Two days after irradiation, the following set of methods was used to assess the general activity, spatial learning, long-term and short-term hippocampus-dependent memory of mice: “open field”, Barnes maze and a novel object recognition test.
Results: It was found that mice whole-body irradiated with a therapeutic beam of carbon ions at a dose of 0.7 Gy do not significantly exhibit an altered model of locomotor and psychoemotional behavior, but they show a deterioration in the memory trace on the 3rd day after training and a violation of episodic memory in the novel object recognition test.
Conclusion: The obtained results complement the accumulating literature data on the effects of low doses of heavy charged particles, and in particular accelerated carbon ions, on the cognitive abilities and behavior of laboratory animals, emphasizing the need to evaluate the observed effects dynamically after exposure.
Keywords: hadron therapy, carbon ions, low doses, behavior, cognitive deficit, radiation safety, mice
For citation: Sorokina SS, Pikalov VA, Popova NR.The Behavioral Effect of Low Dose Carbon Ions Irradiation on Mice in Short-Term Period. Medical Radiology and Radiation Safety. 2025;70(1):16–20. (In Russian). DOI:10.33266/1024-6177-2025-70-1-16-20
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PDF (RUS) Full-text article (in Russian)
Conflict of interest. The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Financing. The article was prepared as part of the state assignment of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation (No. FFRS-2024-0019, ITEB RAS).
Contribution. S.S. Sorokina – development of the research design, conducting the experiment, writing the text of the article; V.A. Pikalov – ensuring the work and conducting an irradiation session at the RBS U-70 Central Research Laboratory (Protvino); N.R. Popova – collection and analysis of literary material, scientific editing of the text, scientific guidance.
Article received: 20.10.2024. Accepted for publication: 25.11.2024.