Studies prove exposure to ionizing radiation can lead to papillary thyroid cancers in patients

There was a significant increase in papillary thyroid cancers in individuals who were witness to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant explosion when they were children. The explosion had resulted in high levels of ionizing radiation in the atmosphere. For research, tissues were collected from Ukrainian individuals who had been exposed to the explosion during childhood. The focus was to identify their cancer driving mutations. Most of these individuals had undergone chromosomal rearrangements in their bodies. These lead to the formation of fusion oncogenes. The fusion also accelerated up-regulation of MAPK signalling. MAPK is the usual cancer associated pathway. However, individuals who were from the same region were the explosion had taken place but not exposed to radiation did not show these oncogenes. Studies were done at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Institute by James Fagin and team. The study shows that cancer in individuals can be triggered by exposure to ionizing radiation.