Program Information

Geant4 Simulations of Spot-Scanned Proton Beam Treatment Plans

T Kanehira*, K Sutherland , T Matsuura , K Umegaki , H Shirato , Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Hokkaido

Presentations

SU-E-J-72 Sunday 3:00PM - 6:00PM Room: Exhibit Hall

Purpose:

To evaluate density inhomogeneities which can effect dose distributions for real-time image gated spot-scanning proton therapy (RGPT), a dose calculation system, using treatment planning system VQA (Hitachi Ltd., Tokyo) spot position data, was developed based on Geant4.

Methods:

A Geant4 application was developed to simulate spot-scanned proton beams at Hokkaido University Hospital. A CT scan (0.98 x 0.98 x 1.25 mm) was performed for prostate cancer treatment with three or four inserted gold markers (diameter 1.5 mm, volume 1.77 mm3) in or near the target tumor. The CT data was read into VQA. A spot scanning plan was generated and exported to text files, specifying the beam energy and position of each spot. The text files were converted and read into our Geant4-based software. The spot position was converted into steering magnet field strength (in Tesla) for our beam nozzle. Individual protons were tracked from the vacuum chamber, through the helium chamber, steering magnets, dose monitors, etc., in a straight, horizontal line. The patient CT data was converted into materials with variable density and placed in a parametrized volume at the isocenter. Gold fiducial markers were represented in the CT data by two adjacent voxels (volume 2.38 mm3). 600,000 proton histories were tracked for each target spot. As one beam contained about 1,000 spots, approximately 600 million histories were recorded for each beam on a blade server. Two plans were considered: two beam horizontal opposed (90 and 270 degree) and three beam (0, 90 and 270 degree).

Results:

We are able to convert spot scanning plans from VQA and simulate them with our Geant4-based code. Our system can be used to evaluate the effect of dose reduction caused by gold markers used for RGPT.

Conclusion:

Our Geant4 application is able to calculate dose distributions for spot scanned proton therapy.

Contact Email: