Microdosimetric-Kinetic Model for Radio-enhancement of Gold Nanoparticles: Comparison with LEM

Numerous studies have strongly supported the application of gold nanoparticles (GNPs) as radio-enhanced agents. In our previous study, the local effect model (LEM I) was adopted to predict the cell survival for MDA-MB-231 cells exposed to 150 kVp X rays after 500 µg/ml GNPs treatment. However, microdosimetric quantities could not be obtained, which were correlated with biological effects on cells. Thus, we developed microdosimetric kinetic model (MKM) for GNP radio-enhancement (GNP-MKM), which uses the microdosimetric quantities such as dose-mean lineal energy with subcellular domain size. Using the Monte Carlo simulation tool Geant4, we estimated the dose-mean lineal energy with secondary radiations from GNPs and absorbed dose in the nucleus. The variations in MKM parameters for different domain sizes, and GNP concentrations, were calculated to compare the survival fractions predicted by both models. With a domain radius of 500 nm and a threshold dose of 20 Gy, the sensitizer enhancement ratio predicted by GNP-MKM and GNP-LEM was 1.41 and 1.29, respectively. The GNP-MKM predictions were much more strongly dependent on the domain size than were the GNP-LEM on the threshold dose. These findings provide another method to predict survival fraction for the GNP radio-enhancement.