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Effect of Oxygen on the Radiosensitivity of Growing Bone and a Possible Danger in the Use of Oxygen during Radiotherapy

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Abstract

THAT oxygen tension has an effect on the radiosensitivity of living tissue has been known for many years, and the subject has been recently reviewed1. The effect was studied by Read2, who established the form of the curve relating oxygen tension and radiosensitivity for a plant tissue. An essentially similar relation has been shown to hold for a wide variety of plant and insect tissues, though comparable data on mammalian tissue is still far from complete. The effect of partial anoxia on the lethal dose of whole-body irradiation has been investigated3; but we are not aware of quantitative data on radiosensitivity at a variety of partial pressures of oxygen for either the local irradiation of tissue in the intact animal or whole-body irradiation.

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References

  1. Patt, H. M., Physiol. Rev., 33, 35 (1953).

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  2. Read, J., Brit. J. Radiol., 25, 89 (1952).

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  3. Dowdy, A. H., Bennett, L. R., and Chastain, S. M., Radiology, 55, 879 (1950).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Medical Research Council Experimental Radiopathology Research Unit, Hammersmith Hospital, London, W.12.

    P. HOWARD-FLANDERS & E. A. WRIGHT

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  1. P. HOWARD-FLANDERS
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  2. E. A. WRIGHT
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HOWARD-FLANDERS, P., WRIGHT, E. Effect of Oxygen on the Radiosensitivity of Growing Bone and a Possible Danger in the Use of Oxygen during Radiotherapy. Nature 175, 428–429 (1955). https://doi.org/10.1038/175428a0

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