• Question: What affect does radioactivity have on cancer cells?

    Asked by BioHazardWaste to Arthur, Clare, Daniel, David, Tora on 11 Nov 2014.
    • Photo: Arthur Dyer

      Arthur Dyer answered on 11 Nov 2014:

      Hi there

      Well the answer isn’t quite as simple as you think.

      Firstly, radiation can cause cancer. This is because Radiation therapy can either damage DNA directly or create charged particles (free radicals) within the cells that can in turn damage the DNA (the molecules inside cells that carry information and pass it from one generation to the next).

      In a normal cell this can cause it to become a cancer cell if the bit of DNA that is damaged is a bit of DNA that controls speed of growth or something similar.

      We also use radiation therapy to kill cancer cells though by damaging their DNA!

      Cancer cells whose DNA is damaged beyond repair stop dividing or die. When the damaged cells die, they are broken down and eliminated by the body’s natural processes.

      The problem is that this also kills all the healthy cells around it so we have to aim the radiation really carefully and make sure that only a few healthy cells are damaged.

      It’s basically like shooting an arrow through the cancer, you’re going to hit all the cells in front and behind the cancer but you’re going to get the cancer too.

    • Photo: Daniel Parsons

      Daniel Parsons answered on 11 Nov 2014:

      Hi there,
      Radioactivity has “it” on all cells!
      Radiation damages the DNA of all cells and essentially destroys them. A radiologist uses this to target areas of cancer cells in the human body in radiotherapy. Radiation also works best at killing cells that are dividing, because cancer cells divide quickly and do it a lot the radiation disproportionately hits them compared with the surrounding cells. That been said some of the cells nearby are also damaged, which is why someone who has radiation therapy is often quite sore close to the targeted areas.

    • Photo: Tora Smulders-Srinivasan

      Tora Smulders-Srinivasan answered on 11 Nov 2014:

      Just to add to the others from my area of expertise:

      Radiation damages the DNA of cells & that will kill cells that are multiplying rapidly.

      Mostly in radiation therapy, this affects the cancer cells — because most of the cells in our bodies do not multiply rapidly.

      But we do have stem cells that do divide rapidly too & those are normal cells in our body — and those can be affected a lot by radiation therapy — so that can be the cause of some of the side effects of radiation therapy.

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