ABSTRACT
66We provide a comprehensive review of mathematical models of cell survival following exposure to ionizing radiation, and their connection to clinical outcomes. We emphasize mechanistic models which aim to account for mechanisms governing cell response to radiation. We discuss approaches to describe the process of translating primary radiation-induced DNA damage into lethal lesions, and role of repair and binary misrepair in this process. We describe reaction-rate models and models accounting for track structure and DNA organization in the cell nucleus, as well as the connection between these models and the popular linear-quadratic model. We discuss the importance of accounting for dose fractionation or protraction by different models. We present different approaches to incorporate biological data revealed by molecular and functional imaging, for example the effect of hypoxia, to model cell survival and tumor response. Finally, we present models specifically developed to predict cell survival and tumor response following large doses per fraction, as in intracranial stereotactic radiosurgery/radiotherapy and stereotactic body radiotherapy.
