France HADRON: national infrastructure for hadrontherapy research including ETOILE, ARCHADE and protontherapy centers
Résumé
Hadrontherapy is an advanced form of radiotherapy able to cure very radioresistant tumors. It is developing since two decades mainly in Japan and Europe in Germany, Italy and Austria. The input of CERN has been important in its development in Europe. France is involved in that domain since 20 years thanks to its two protontherapy centers, ICPO in Orsay and Médicyc in Nice. This experience as well as the exploratory development of carbon ion therapy in the U.S.A., and the further clinical use in Japan and Europe, have given rise to projects in France for both a treatment center (ETOILE in Lyon) and a research center (ARCHADE in Caen). Different applied research programs have been associated to these projects involving many different teams located in different towns in France.