ABSTRACT
Biologically based measures (“biomarkers”) have emerged as useful tools for disease diagnosis and prognosis, as well as for drug discovery and treatment selection in cancer (Ludwig and Weinstein 2005). Ÿe recent evolution in biotechnology (in particular high-throughput genomics and proteomics techniques) has led to the foundation of a new £eld in radiation oncology denoted “radiogenomics” (West et al. 2005). Ÿese new molecular techniques carry great potential to revolutionize the £eld of radiobiology (West, Elliott, and Burnet 2007; Bentzen 2008; Bentzen, Bu¢a, and Wilson 2008). Recent years have witnessed an extraordinary surge in the application of these techniques for investigating radiotherapy response in di¢erent cancer sites such as breast (Nimeus-Malmstrom et al. 2008), cervix (Klopp et al. 2008), and head and neck (Pramana et al. 2007).
