ReviewNature reviews. Cancer2026
Mechanisms, challenges and opportunities for FLASH radiotherapy in cancer.
Review in Nature reviews. Cancer, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 17 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
17 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Global clinical landscape and multidisciplinary translational frontiers of FLASH radiotherapy: a systematic review and visualized bibliometric mapping based on WoSCC and PubMed (2014-2025).Frontiers in medicine · 2026Pooled it
- Expert consensus on clinical trial design guidelines for FLASH radiotherapy.Precision radiation oncology · 2026Article
- Reduced corneal toxicity following whole brain irradiation in mice.Clinical and translational radiation oncology · 2026Article
- Review
- FLASH radiotherapy: physico-chemical considerations on ionisation tracks, radical reactions, and the role of oxygen.Radiation oncology (London, England) · 2026Review
- Landscape and evolutionary trends of nanotechnology in cancer radiosensitization.Discover nano · 2026Review
- Harnessing the sparing effect of FLASH-RT: From phenomenon observation, radiophysical determinants to molecular mechanisms and synergistic strategies.Materials today. Bio · 2026Review
- Towards FLASH Radiotherapy in Lung Cancer: A Review on Preclinical Evidence and Technical Feasibility.Cancers · 2026Review
- From developmental origins to relapse: molecular and therapeutic insights in medulloblastoma.Child's nervous system : ChNS : official journal of the International Society for Pediatric Neurosurgery · 2026Review
- Dosimetric Characterization and Workflow Optimization of the FLASH-SARRP for Reliable Preclinical Radiobiological Studies.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- A new perspective on radiotherapy in the comprehensive treatment of cancer.Precision radiation oncology · 2026Review
- Three-Discipline Collaborative Radiation Therapy (3DCRT) debate: Medical physics should focus less on geometric precision and more on biological outcomes.Journal of applied clinical medical physics · 2026Article
- Radiation as an immune modulator: mechanisms and implications for combination with immunotherapy.Nature reviews. Cancer · 2026Review
- Early microglial activation in the TME enables FLASH-RT to eradicate medulloblastoma while promoting neuron-astrocyte crosstalk to minimize toxicity in the hippocampus.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Oxygen Depletion in FLASH Particle Therapy: Effects of Linear Energy Transfer and Ion Track Structure.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- FLASH radiotherapy as an emerging paradigm in radioimmunotherapy: biological rationale, preclinical evidence, and translational roadmap.Frontiers in immunology · 2026Review
- Influence of Fractionation and Beam Sequencing on Absorbed Dose to Circulating Lymphocytes During Ultra-High Dose Rate and Conventional Radiotherapy: An In Silico Study.JCO clinical cancer informaticsArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
FLASH radiotherapy has the potential to improve both patient quality of life and outcomes by delivering radiation at ultrahigh dose rates to effectively target tumours while sparing healthy tissues. However, the differential sensitivity of healthy tissues versus tumours to FLASH radiotherapy remains unexplained. In this Perspective, we hypothesize that FLASH radiotherapy distinguishes healthy tissues from tumours based on subtle functional and structural biological differences. We identify commonalities present in the various healthy tissues that are spared by FLASH radiotherapy that might be lost during tumorigenesis. We also propose that a specific class of proteins, termed long-lived proteins, define a critical radiolytic target that are present in nearly every healthy tissue that is FLASH radiotherapy resistant yet are absent in tumours. We extend this structural hypothesis further by suggesting that tumour and extracellular matrix rigidity affects sensitivity to changes in radiotherapy dose rate, where more rigid and dense desmoplastic tumours are more sensitive to FLASH radiotherapy than those possessing more elasticity. Substantiating these concepts experimentally may provide a new and generalized mechanism of action of radiation effects and may therefore inform clinical trial designs by identifying those tumour subclasses expected to exhibit optimal responses to FLASH radiotherapy.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.