Dr. Gino Fallone

Biography

Fellow: Canadian College of Physicists in Medicine Diplomat: American Board of Medical Physics Diplomat: American Board of Radiology Professional Physicist: Canadian Association of Physicists Fellow: American Association of Physicists in Medicine Fellow: Canadian Organization of Medical Physicists Knight, Order of Merit, Italy (Cavaliere, Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana).

Research Interest

Integration of a Linac with an MRI System for Real-Time Image-Guided Radiotherapy. Please see the Linac-MR.ca website. Image-Guided Adaptive Radiotherapy (IGAR) The main goal of the research program entitled "Image-guided adaptive radiotherapy (IGAR)" in CBIAR, is to achieve the maximum curing potential by precisely delivering a radiation dose distribution that is "sculpted" to the anatomical and biological extent of the tumor while delivering minimal dose to healthy tissue to reduce side effects. The IGAR program incorporates one of the world's first human Helical TomoTherapy System, a ultra-high human whole body (3 T) MR Imaging and Spectroscopy System, an animal 9.4T MR Imaging and Spectroscopy System, an image-fusion laboratory, and the computer laboratories for the Canadian Computational Cancer Center (C4). The MR systems provide the anatomical, functional, metabolic and biochemical information to identify diseases at an earlier stage, and monitor treatment response immediately after and at intervals after treatment. The resultant information is integrated with PET images within our image fusion laboratories to design advanced adaptive radiation therapy delivered by the experimental TomoTherapy system. The C4 facilities will evaluate the clinical outcome with respect to treatment by imaging follow-up and by correlating with gene profiling information provided of PolyomX. This evaluation will allow the quantification of fundamental cancer processes and its varying treatment, in an effort to develop novel treatment strategies. We deliver the dose by a Helical TomoTherapy system, a revolutionary treatment device that was funded by the CFI, ASRA and the ACF (Total of about $5M. Conventional modern CT and MR (1.5 T) do not show the full extent of the tumor. To obtain the full biological extent of the tumor and the healthy tissues (functional, biochemical information in addition to the anatomical information), we have received funds from the CFI and ASRIP (about $10 M) to install a ultra-high field MR system. The system comprises a 3 T MRI and MRS system ($4 M) from Philips which is far superior in imaging capabilities to conventional 1.5 T systems. In addition, we were able to acquire a 9.4 T (super high field) animal MRI and MRS system to perform studies in MR molecular imaging. The latter system brings us to the limit of what futuristic MR imaging and spectroscopy can do for cancer detection, and cancer therapy from radiation and from other cancer treatment agents. The acquisition of the latter system has been made possible with the partial financial $660K commitment from the ACF. The IGAR facilities are unique in the world, and allow the delivery of advanced adaptive radiation treatments, offer functional and metabolic information of cancer, and quantify cancer processes, and make the Cross Cancer Institute the most advanced center in the world for cancer molecular imaging and adaptive radiation therapy.