Massimo PintoENEA | ENEA · National Institute of Ionizing Radiation Metrology INMRI
Massimo Pinto
Ph.D.
About
54
Publications
14,367
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747
Citations
Citations since 2017
Introduction
A research scientist in the field of metrology for ionizing radiation dosimetry. Works in ionometry using free-air chambers as well as graphite calorimetry. Along with experimental techniques, Massimo uses Monte carlo methods for radiation dosimetry and software to pilot hardware on the measurement chains dedicated to calorimetric measurements.
Additional affiliations
May 2010 - present
Position
- Researcher
Description
- Research Scientist in the Radiation Dosimetry Division. Working on primary standards of air kerma (low energy x-rays, medium-energy x-rays and 60Co) and absorbed dose to water (medium-energy x-rays)
June 2003 - August 2006
June 2003 - August 2006
Education
September 1998 - July 2002
September 1992 - July 1998
Publications
Publications (54)
To investigate the optimal use of XR-RV3 GafChromic(®) films to assess patient skin dose in interventional radiology while addressing the means to reduce uncertainties in dose assessment.
XR-Type R GafChromic films have been shown to represent the most efficient and suitable solution to determine patient skin dose in interventional procedures. As f...
Proton and ion beams are radiotherapy modalities of increasing importance and interest. Because of the different biological dose response of these radiations as compared to high-energy photon beams, the current approach of treatment prescription is based on the product of the absorbed dose to water and a biological weighting factor, but this is fou...
This report presents the results of the first international comparison of primary measurement standards of absorbed dose to water for the medium-energy X-ray range. Three of the participants (VSL, PTB, LNE-LNHB) used their existing water calorimeter based standards and one participant (ENEA) recently developed a new standard based on a water-graphi...
The Italian National Institute of Ionizing Radiation Metrology (ENEA-INMRI) has designed and built a graphite calorimeter that, in a water phantom, has allowed the determination of the absorbed dose to water in medium-energy x-rays with generating voltages from 180 to 250 kV. The new standard is a miniaturized three-bodies calorimeter, with a disc-...
More than 23 million workers worldwide are occupationally
exposed to ionizing radiation and all people in the world are exposed to
environmental radiation. The mean exposure, that is the mean annual dose of
per person, is dominated by medical applications and exposure to natural
sources. Due to recent developments in healthcare, e.g. the increasing...
Clinical dosimetry is typically performed using ion chambers calibrated in terms of absorbed dose to water. As primary measurement standards for this quantity for low and medium energy x-rays are available only since a few years, most dosimetry protocols for this photon energy range are still based on air kerma calibration. For that reason, data fo...
The IAEA is currently coordinating a multi-year project to update the TRS-398 Code of Practice for the dosimetry of external beam radiotherapy based on standards of absorbed dose to water. One major aspect of the project is the determination of new beam quality correction factors, k_Q, for megavoltage photon beams consistent with developments in ra...
The potential for a radiological or nuclear attack has been widely acknowledged in the last two decades. The use of a dirty bomb by terrorist organizations is considered to be a credible threat for which policymakers and relevant security agencies must prepare. Radioactive materials are stored in thousands of facilities around the world and may not...
The beam quality correction factor,kQ, which corrects for the difference in the ionization chamber response between the reference and clinical beam quality, is an integral part of radiation therapy dosimetry. The uncertainty ofkQis one of the most significant sources of uncertainty in the dose determination. To improve the accuracy of availablekQda...
Organic plastic scintillators are attractive for several applications in medical dosimetry due to their high degree of water equivalence and their mininal perturbation of the radiation field. There is,however, a non-proportionality between the produced scintillation light and the absorbed energy for electrons below about 125keV. This ionization que...
Purpose
To calculate by Monte Carlo simulations kQ factors for Farmer-type ionization chambers in megavoltage photon beams using the new key dosimetry data recommended by the International Commission on Radiation Units and Measurements (ICRU) Report 90.
Methods
Monte Carlo calculations were performed with the EGSnrc code system using both the ICRU...
Purpose
The International Commission on Radiation Units and Measurements (ICRU) in the Report 90 [1] has recommended adoption of new values for key data required for ionizing radiation dosimetry. In the framework of the EMPIR RTNORM project “kQ factors in modern external beam radiotherapy applications to update IAEA TRS 398”, beam quality correctio...
Purpose
Fano theory states that charged particle fluence through a medium should be independent of mass density. Therefore, the validity of a Monte Carlo code depends on whether the transport of charged particles complies with this theory. In this work, in the framework of the EMPIR funded RTNORM project, the validity of the Fano theory in the Mont...
There is a continued need for further clarification of various aspects of radiation-induced chromosomal aberration, including its correlation with radiation track structure. As part of the EMRP joint research project, Biologically Weighted Quantities in Radiotherapy (BioQuaRT), we performed experimental and theoretical analyses on chromosomal aberr...
Over the last few years a broad array of organizations have practiced terrorism with the aim to achieve political, criminal, religious, and ideological goals. These acts have revitalized awareness of the threat of attacks involving chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear weapons. In particular radiological and nuclear methods are likely to be...
Introduction
According to the IAEA TRS 398, in kilovoltage X-ray beams the calibration factor in terms of absorbed dose to water (ND,w,Q) for an ionization chamber can be derived from its calibration factor in terms of air kerma (NK,Q) if the chamber overall correction factor, pQ, is known. However, literature pQ values are lacking, especially when...
The aim of the ‘BioQuaRT’ (Biologically weighted Quantities in RadioTherapy) project is to develop measurement techniques for characterising charged particle track structure on different length scales, and to correlate at the cellular level the track structure properties with the biological effects of radiation. This multi-scale approach will allow...
A direct comparison of the standards for air kerma of the Istituto Nazionale di Metrologia delle Radiazioni Ionizzanti (ENEA-INMRI), Italy and of the Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (BIPM) was carried out in the 60Co radiation beam of the BIPM in June 2015. The comparison result, evaluated as a ratio of the ENEA and the BIPM standards for...
A key comparison has been made between the air-kerma standards of the ENEA, Italy and the BIPM in the medium-energy x-ray range. The results show the standards to be in general agreement at the level of the expanded uncertainty (k = 2) of the comparison of 6.2 parts in 103. The results are analysed and presented in terms of degrees of equivalence,...
Funded within the European Metrology Research Programme (EMRP) [1], the joint research project "Biologically weighted quantities in radiotherapy" (BioQuaRT) [2] aims to develop measurement and simulation techniques for determining the physical properties of ionising particle tracks on different length scales (about 2 nm to 10 μm), and to investigat...
This paper summarizes the progress on the construction of a graphite calorimeter for the measurement of absorbed dose to water D w in medium-energy filtered x-ray qualities, as part of the EMRP-funded project "Metrology for radiotherapy using complex radiation fields" (MetrExtRT, http://radiotherapy-emrp.eu/). The design and the construction of a n...
Low-intensity radioactive sources emitting low-energy photons are used in the clinic for low dose-rate brachytherapy treatments of tumours. The dosimetry of these sources is based on reference air kerma rate measurements. The absorbed dose rate to water at the reference depth d0 = 1 cm, , is then obtained by a conversion procedure with a large rela...
The Radiation Research Podcast was funded just over five years ago by a few Radiation Research Society members. To date, the volunteers running the podcast have produced and published online, open access, over 70 audio interviews. The program includes monthly interviews with authors of articles, award winners, and other recordings at conferences, s...
Abstract Low-intensity radioactive sources emitting low-energy photons are used in the clinic for low dose-rate brachytherapy treatments of tumours. The dosimetry of these sources is based on reference air kerma rate measurements. The absorbed dose rate to water at the ...
A first key comparison has been made between the air-kerma standards of the ENEA-INMRI, Italy and the BIPM in mammography x-ray beams. The results show the standards to be in agreement at the level of the standard uncertainty for the comparison of 4.8 parts in 103. The results are analysed and presented in terms of degrees of equivalence, suitable...
Adaptive response (AR) is a term that has been generally accepted to describe the ability of a low 'priming' radiation dose to decrease the cell response to a subsequent higher 'challenging' dose. The main proposed mechanisms to explain AR are: increased efficiency of DNA repair and induction of antioxidant enzymes. A model that considers a modulat...
Adaptive response (AR) is a term that has been generally accepted to describe the ability of a low 'priming' radiation dose to decrease the cell response to a subsequent higher 'challenging' dose. The main proposed mechanisms to explain AR are: increased efficiency of DNA repair and induction of antioxidant enzymes. A model that considers a modulat...
The study of radiation-induced bystander effects in normal human cells maintained in three-dimensional (3D) architecture provides more in vivo-like conditions and is relevant to human risk assessment. Linear energy transfer, dose and dose rate have been considered as critical factors in propagating radiation-induced effects. This investigation uses...
In this paper we present results from an experiment aimed at investi- gating whether living cells are influenced by background ionizing radiation. Parallel human cell cultures were set-up in two separate laboratories and maintained for sev- eral months under identical conditions but for a 80× different level of background ionizing radiation. Period...
Previously we reported that yeast and Chinese hamster V79 cells cultured under reduced levels of background environmental ionizing radiation show enhanced susceptibility to damage caused by acute doses of genotoxic agents. Reduction of environmental radiation dose rate was achieved by setting up an underground laboratory at Laboratori Nazionali del...
Some years ago we performed two experiments aimed at studying the influence of the background radiation on living matter by exploiting the low radiation background environment ill the underground Gran Sasso Laboratory of the INFN. Their results were consistent with the the hypothesis that the "normal" background radiation determines all adaptive re...
Targeted therapies result in heterogeneous drug delivery, often with highly variable drug uptake in the targeted cells and significant numbers of cells that are essentially untargeted. However both the variably targeted cells and neighboring bystander cells may respond to the treatment. Using ionizing radiation as an example of a targeted therapeut...
Prediction of risks and therapeutic outcome in nuclear medicine largely rely on calculation of the absorbed dose. Absorbed dose specification is complex due to the wide variety of radiations emitted, non-uniform activity distribution, biokinetics, etc. Conventional organ absorbed dose estimates assumed that radioactivity is distributed uniformly th...
Research on the radiation-induced bystander effect has been carried out mainly in 2-D tissue culture systems. This study uses
a 3-D model, wherein apparently normal human diploid fibroblasts (AG1522) are grown in a carbon scaffold, to investigate the
induction of a G1 checkpoint in bystander cells present alongside radiolabelled cells. Cultures wer...
The rejoining kinetics of double-stranded DNA fragments, along with measurements of residual damage after postirradiation incubation, are often used as indicators of the biological relevance of the damage induced by ionizing radiation of different qualities. Although it is widely accepted that high-LET radiation-induced double-strand breaks (DSBs)...
In studies of radiation-induced DNA fragmentation and repair, analytical models may provide rapid and easy-to-use methods to test simple hypotheses regarding the breakage and rejoining mechanisms involved. The random breakage model, according to which lesions are distributed uniformly and independently of each other along the DNA, has been the mode...
To assess the applicability of methods of quantification of double-strand breaks (DSB) based on the random breakage paradigm, measuring yield and distribution of DSB induced by varying radiation quality.
240 kVp X-rays and (238)Pu alpha-particles were used to induce DSB in AG01522B primary human fibroblasts. DNA molecular weight distributions were...
When a charged-particle track intercepts the chromatin fibre in DNA of mammalian cells, clustered damage is induced depending
on the DNA conformation, local environment and track structure. Intra-track correlated DNA damage may have a higher probability
of being mis-repaired or left un-repaired. Fragment size-distributions of DNA double strand brea...
The induction of DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) by ionising radiation and subsequent rejoining were studied in normal human fibroblasts in vitro, using radiation of different qualities. Radiation of increasing linear energy transfer (LET) can induce local hot spots of energy deposition that may result in DNA damage that is difficult to repair, and...
Underpinning current models of the mechanisms of the action of radiation is a central role for DNA damage and in particular double-strand breaks (DSBs). For radiations of different LET, there is a need to know the exact yields and distributions of DSBs in human cells. Most measurements of DSB yields within cells now rely on pulsed-field gel electro...
Purpose:
To analyse the currently existing methods to infer the extent of cellular DNA damage induced by ionizing radiation when the pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) technique is used.
Results and conclusions:
PFGE is currently the method of choice for the measurement of radiation-induced double-strand breaks (dsb). For accurate determina...
Projects
Projects (3)
The aim of the EMRP Joint Research Project BioQuaRT was to develop measurement and simulation techniques for determining the physical properties of ionising particle track structure on different length scales, and to investigate at the cellular level how these track structure characteristics correlate with the biological effects of radiation. The relevant length scales range from about 2 nm (diameter of the DNA double helix) to about 10 µm (diameter of the cell nucleus).
The EMRP was jointly funded by the EMRP participating countries within EURAMET and the European Union.
This Joint Research Project (JRP) was prepared in response to the Selected Research Topic SRT-n03 of the EMPIR 2016 co-normative call.
Aim of the JRP proposal is to contribute to the update of the IAEA TRS-398 Code of Practice for dosimetry in radiation therapy of cancer.
Participants to the JRP proposal include ENEA (Coordinator, Italy), VSL (the Netherlands), CEA (France), NPL (UK), STUK (Finland), DTU (Denmark), the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium), the Technische Hochschule Mittelhessen (Germany), and the Associação do Instituto Superior Técnico para a Investigação e Desenvolvimento (IST-ID, Portugal)
