Kelleter, L;
Radogna, R;
Volz, L;
Attree, D;
Basharina-Freshville, A;
Seco, J;
Saakyan, R;
(2020)
A scintillator-based range telescope for particle therapy.
Physics in Medicine & Biology
10.1088/1361-6560/ab9415.
(In press).
Preview |
Text
Kelleter+et+al_2020_Phys._Med._Biol._10.1088_1361-6560_ab9415.pdf - Accepted Version Download (4MB) | Preview |
Abstract
The commissioning and operation of a particle therapy centre requires an extensive set of detectors for measuring various parameters of the treatment beam. Among the key devices are detectors for beam range quality assurance. In this work, a novel range telescope based on plastic scintillator and read out by a large-scale CMOS sensor is presented. The detector is made of a stack of 49 plastic scintillator sheets with a thickness of 2--3~mm and an active area of $100\times100$~mm$^2$, resulting in a total physical stack thickness of 124.2~mm. This compact design avoids optical artefacts that are common in other scintillation detectors. The range of a proton beam is reconstructed using a novel Bragg curve model that incorporates scintillator quenching effects. Measurements to characterise the performance of the detector were carried out at the Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (HIT, Heidelberg, GER) and the Clatterbridge Cancer Centre (CCC, Bebington, UK). The maximum difference between the measured range and the reference range was found to be 0.41~mm at a proton beam range of 310~mm and was dominated by detector alignment uncertainties. With the new detector prototype, the water-equivalent thickness of PMMA degrader blocks has been reconstructed within $\pm0.1$~mm. An evaluation of the radiation hardness proves that the range reconstruction algorithm is robust following the deposition of 6,300~Gy peak dose into the detector. Furthermore, small variations in the beam spot size and transverse beam position are shown to have a negligible effect on the range reconstruction accuracy. The potential for range measurements of ion beams is also investigated.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | A scintillator-based range telescope for particle therapy |
| Location: | England |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1088/1361-6560/ab9415 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6560/ab9415 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | As the Version of Record of this article is going to be/has been published on a gold open access basis under a CC BY 3.0 licence, this Accepted Manuscript is available for reuse under a CC BY 3.0 licence immediately. Everyone is permitted to use all or part of the original content in this article, provided that they adhere to all the terms of the licence https://creativecommons.org/licences/by/3.0 |
| Keywords: | proton therapy, pencil beam range, quality assurance, scintillator, CMOS sensor, Bragg curve, particle therapy, Birks constant, light quenching |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences > Dept of Physics and Astronomy |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10098420 |
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
