Ionizing radiation can cause damage on DNA (such as physically breaking one or both of the sugar phosphate backbones, breaking the base pairs or hydrogen bonds of the DNA), inhibit synthesis of DNA and promote degradation of DNA. These effects will further change the configuration of DNA self-assembled nanostructures, which can be applied in detection of ionizing radiation. This work reviews the developments of DNA self-assembly technology in recent years, and introduces the applications of DNA self-assembly in ionizing radiation detection, especially in detection of α and β particle radiations based on DNA tile self-assembly.Cited