Analysis of fractal dimension of lymphocytes exposed to different doses of ionizing radiation through box counting method

The aim of this study was to develop software to estimate the fractal dimensions of lymphocyte nuclei irradiated with doses of gamma radiation in order to evaluate its usability as a morphometric biomarker of human exposures to ionizing radiation.

A software based on Python language was developed to estimate the fractal dimensions of irradiated and non-irradiated lymphocyte nuclei. The method applied was the well-established box-counting.

Known mathematical fractals from the literature were used to validate the software, which presented the expected values of fractal dimensions for such objects. In the experimental group, irradiated with gamma radiation, it was observed changes in values of fractal dimensions, some with statistical significance (p < 0.05). However, these differences became more pronounced only for doses as high as 4 Gy.

The developed software here proved to be a promising tool for analyzing changes in chromatin roughness of irradiated lymphocytes. This is of potential use as a morphometric biomarker of ionizing radiation, as a quick and easy method to perform especially in cases of large amounts of samples to be analyzed, such as in mass casualties..