Abstract
Accurate biodosimetry is critical for assessing radiation exposure in radiological emergencies, occupational monitoring, and clinical management, where precise dose estimation informs life-saving decisions and regulatory compliance. Current gold-standard cytogenetic methods face limitations in sensitivity and reproducibility, especially at low doses (< 0.5 Gy) (practical limitations at low doses, including very low dicentric yields, higher statistical noise, and greater scoring uncertainty as aberration frequencies near background levels). This study presents a systematic comparison of pan-centromeric fluorescence in situ hybridization (pan-cent-FISH) and Giemsa staining for detecting dicentric (DC) and ring (R) chromosomes following 60Co-γ irradiation (0–3 Gy). Analysis of more than 15,000 metaphases per technique revealed enhanced sensitivity of pan-cent-FISH technique, demonstrating a 1.72-fold higher linear coefficient and enhanced (1.13-fold) quadratic coefficient (β), indicating improved sensitivity across both low and high dose ranges. Blind validation with eight samples showed pan-cent-FISH achieved ~ 2-fold greater accuracy, with mean absolute differences of 0.0538 Gy (vs. 0.1105 Gy for Giemsa) and average relative errors of 7.13% (vs. 15.35% for Giemsa). At low doses (0.1 Gy), pan-cent-FISH maintained 9.0% error, while Giemsa exceeded acceptable limits (21.0% error). The standardized fluorescence detection used for the technique eliminated morphological ambiguities, reducing false negatives by ~ 40% and improving first-pass accuracy.
Data availability
All data generated in this study are included in the article. Additional data supporting the findings are available from the corresponding author (Email ID: nageshnb@barc.gov.in), upon reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
The authors deeply appreciate the valuable assistance and technical support provided by Mr. Shrikant Jagtap and the lab’s technical staff.
Funding
This work was supported by the institutional fund of the host institute (BARC, Mumbai, India). No external funding was involved in this study.
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R.K.C., A.N., D.F.V., K.B.S., S.F. and N.N.B.: Conceptualization, methodology, data curation and writing; B.K.S., A.K., D.K.: Review, editing, supervision and resources.
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Approval for this study’s research proposal was granted by the Institutional Ethics Committee of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) in Mumbai, India. The project was conducted in accordance with the ethical principles outlined in the declaration. Informed ethical consent was obtained from the participating human volunteer following a comprehensive explanation of the project.
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Chaurasia, R.K., Notnani, A., Vaz, D.F. et al. Pan centromeric FISH enhances precision in radiation biodosimetry. Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-34407-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-34407-3
