04/09/2025
By Victoria Ainsworth
The Kennedy College of Science, Department of Physics, invites you to a Doctoral Dissertation defense by Victoria Ainsworth titled, "Global Health, Nanoparticle Aided Radiotherapy of the Lungs and Ways to Increase Accessible Cancer Care”
Date: Thursday, April 10 Time: 10:30 a.m.- 12;30 p.m.
Location: This will be a virtual defense on Zoom.
Advisor:
Wilfred Ngwa, Ph.D., Department of Radiation Oncology, Johns Hopkins University
Erno Sajo, Ph.D., Department of Physics and Applied Physics, University of Massachusetts Lowell
Committee Members:
Erin Bertelsen, Ph.D., Department of Physics and Applied Physics, University of Massachusetts Lowell
Abstract:
In this multi-thematic dissertation, the two seemingly disparate areas of global health and nanoparticle aided radiation therapy of the lungs are combined to present a unique perspective on cancer care. While each are standalone in their respective domains, together they provide a broader picture of work being done to not only improve cancer care but also to increase accessibility of care in a way rarely explored in a single work. To this end, this work consists of two volumes, each focusing on one of the two themes, before being connected during the final chapter for recommendations going forward. No approach to cancer care is done as a solo-mission and as such all work presented here is the result of collaboration, with the author’s contributions highlighted.
There are many barriers to care that exist globally disproportionately affecting low- and middle-income countries such as Nigeria. Of these barriers, lack of personnel, inconsistent training availability and provider understanding of cancer are the focus of this work. Specifically, Africa is in need of 1669 medical physicists, who are responsible for many aspects of radiation safety and control. Oncologists, responsible for diagnosis and treatment of cancers, are not as confident in treating breast cancer as they should be, translating into strained relationships with their breast patients. To address the knowledge gap for both physicists and oncologists, this work reports on the creation and implementation of a continuing medical physics education course as well as a breast cancer specific continuing medical education course for oncologists which was further contextualized via breast cancer patient focus group discussions.
The second focus of this work is aerosol transport computations for the support of treatment planning in nanoparticle-aided radiation therapy for lung cancer. When administered systemically, nanoparticles have a long way to travel to the tumor, and if functionalized to carry medicine, they could end up delivering the medicine in many different sites besides the tumor. If administered via direct injection to the tumor, the treatment could leak out, leaving a suboptimal concentration within the volume of interest. When administered via inhalation, however, nanoparticles deposit within the lung, and are locally taken up into the bloodstream and preferentially accumulate within the lung tumor volume. In this work, the deterministic aerosol code SAEROSA is used to model the aerosol dynamics of inhaled nanoparticles within the airways and alveoli throughout 23 generations in the lung. As opposed to computational fluid dynamics (CFD) or multiple path particle dosimetry simulations, SAEROSA considers detailed aerosol physics, including coagulation and various transport mechanisms due to complex environmental conditions, and can predict size-specific surface deposition while its computational cost is a fraction of that demanded by CFD models. In this dissertation, size, space, and time-dependent aerosol concentrations and depositions in 23 generations during inhale, breath hold, and exhale are computed and analyzed. This is the first such study with the aim of providing fundamental data for an eventual treatment planning algorithm for nanoparticle-aided lung cancer therapy.