Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT) is a radiation science which is emerging as a hopeful tool in treating cancer, by selectively concentrating boron compounds in tumour cells and then subjecting the tumour cells to epithermal neutron beam radiation. BNCT bestows upon the nuclear reaction that occurs when Boron-10, a stable isotope, is irradiated with low-energy thermal neutrons to yield α particles (Helium-4) and recoiling lithium-7 nuclei. A large number of 10 Boron (10B) atoms have to be localized on or within neoplastic cells for BNCT to be effective, and an adequate number of thermal neutrons have to be absorbed by the 10B atoms to maintain a lethal 10B (n, α) lithium-7 reaction. The most exclusive property of BNCT is that it can deposit an immense dose gradient between the tumour cells and normal cells. BNCT integrates the fundamental focusing perception of chemotherapy and the gross anatomical localization proposition of traditional radiotherapy.
There is an increase in oral cancer burden day by day. The mainstream treatment modalities in treating cancer are surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Surgical annihilation is highly efficient in primary tumours, but it is limited to surgically sizeable and approachable tumours and thus cancer cells may not be wholely evacuated. Chemotherapy is the use of chemical drugs to fight cancer. The systemically administrated drugs circulate in the body to kill cells that divide rapidly, especially cancer cells. It commonly has significant side effects due to drug toxicity to normal cells and is subject to the development of resistance by the cancer cells. Radiation utilizes high energy ionization particles like X-rays, gamma rays or electrons, to damage cells at molecular level and is often used as an integral approach, to exterminate remaining cancer cells after surgery. But, it can cause destruction to the lively/healthy tissues neighbouring the cancer cells or in the lane of radiation beam.
Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT) is a technique that selectively aims to treat tumour cells sparring the normal cells using Boron compound. Gordon Locher was the first one to propose the principle of BNCT in 1936 and hypothesized that if boron could be selectively concentrated in a tumour mass and the volume then exposed to thermal neutrons, a higher radiation dose to the tumour relative to adjacent normal tissue