The challenge to study radiotherapy for pre-clinical pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma(PDAC) is lack of image-guided system providing strong soft-tissue contrast. Bioluminescence imaging is an attractive solution, but it is inadequate to localize movable PDAC at single projection. With these targeting uncertainties, large radiation beam is commonly used. Therefore, we innovated bioluminescence tomography(BLT) to guide conformal irradiation for PDAC. Our BLT could retrieve orthotopic PDAC volume within 0.5-2mm accuracy at 2-6mm depth, even tumor located at various locations at given study days. Our BLT offers unique opportunities to localize PDAC for conformal irradiation, reduce normal tissue toxicity, and therefore increase study reproducibility.
|