Thymic lymphomas induced by high-LET carbon-ion irradiation in B6C3F1 mice

Each irradiation was conducted with a 290 MeV/u carbon-ion beam (average LET 60 keV/µm) at the Heavy Ion Medical Accelerator in Chiba, Japan. The mice were monitored throughout their lifespan.

Thymic lymphomas obtained from these mice were analyzed to identify characteristic genomic alterations induced by carbon-ion irradiation. The results revealed that thymic lymphomas arising after four-fractionated high-LET carbon-ion irradiation frequently exhibited loss of heterozygosity in the region containing the thymic lymphoma–associated gene Ikzf1 on chromosome 11, due to extensive genomic deletions.