Radiation-induced bystander effect: early process and rapid assessment.

Radiation-induced bystander effect (RIBE) is a biological process that has received attention over the past two decades. RIBE refers to a plethora of biological effects in non-irradiated cells, including induction of genetic damages, gene expression, cell transformation, proliferation and cell death, which are initiated by receiving bystander signals released from irradiated cells. RIBE brings potential hazards to normal tissues in radiotherapy, and imparts a higher risk from low-dose radiation than we previously thought. Detection with proteins related to DNA damage and repair, cell cycle control, proliferation, etc. have enabled rapid assessment of RIBE in a number of research systems such as cultured cells, three-dimensional tissue models and animal models. Accumulated experimental data have suggested that RIBE may be initiated rapidly within a time frame as short as several minutes after radiation. These have led to the requirement of techniques capable of rapidly assessing RIBE itself as well as assessing the early processes involved.