Peter van Luijk started his work on the prevention, prediction and treatment of normal tissue damage studying volume effects in the rat spinal cord using high-precision proton irradiation at the Kernfysisch Versneller Instituut of the University of Groningen, where he obtained his PhD in Physics in 2003. His main finding was that the response of the spinal cord to radiation depends strongly on repair of irradiated tissue, initiated from non-irradiated tissue. Therefore he subsequently centered his work on the hypothesis that such interactions are critical determinants of the tolerance of tissues to irradiation. He continued this work first as a post-doc and currently as an assistant professor at the department Radiation Oncology of the University Medical Center Groningen. Similar to what was observed for the spinal cord, he found that the response of the parotid gland to radiation strongly depends on whether or not a limited sub-volume rich in stem cells is included in the radiation field. In addition radiation damage to heart and lung were found to mutually enhance each other. Currently he is working on the clinical translation of these findings.