• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.507-514
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• 2023

The purpose of this study is to find a formula that can easily calculate the effective photon energy in the X-ray beam of mammography. The tube voltage measured for each set tube voltage was obtained using the X2 MAM Sensor. The mass attenuation coefficient for aluminum of the aluminum filter was obtained from the half value layer measurement from each measured tube voltage X-ray beam. The mass attenuation coefficient of aluminum obtained from each measured tube voltage X-ray beam was corresponded to the mass attenuation coefficient of aluminum for each photon energy obtained from NIST. The photon energy corresponding to the matching mass attenuation coefficient was determined as the effective photon energy. The formula for calculating the determined effective photon energy was obtained by polynomial matching of the effective photon energy for each tube voltage in the Origin pro 2019b statistical program as y = 28.98968-1.91738x + 0.07786x2-0.000946717x3. Here, x is the measuring tube voltage and y is the effective photon energy. The calculation formula of the effective photon energy of the mammography X-ray beam obtained in this study is considered to be very useful in obtaining the interaction coefficient between the X-ray beam and a certain substance in clinical practice.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.707-713
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• 2024

In CT equipments, the contrast scale changes as the equipment ages. In order to maintain a constant contrast scale in clinical practice, users must perform periodic quality control. In this study, the contrast scale for each effective photon energy was determined and analyzed based on CT slice images of the CT number calibration block in the AAPM CT performance phantom. CT slice images of the CT number calibration block were obtained with five scans each at 80, 100, 120, and 140 kVp X-ray beams. In the 5 CT slice images obtained for each tube voltage, the average CT number of the averages was calculated from the average CT numbers measured by setting the region of interest to water and 5 pins. For water and 5 pins, a linear regression analysis was performed on the average CT number of the averages calculated for each tube voltage versus the line attenuation coefficient for each photon energy, and the photon energies with the largest correlation coefficients of 58.5, 65, 71, and 77 keV were found to be effective photon energies. decided. The line attenuation coefficient used to determine this effective photon energy was automatically determined as the effective linear attenuation coefficient. For the effective photon energy, a linear equation was obtained by linear regression analysis of the average CT number of the averages in water and the five pins versus the difference in effective linear attenuation coefficient between the five pins and water. The contrast scale was determined by taking the slope of the obtained linear equation as the reciprocal. The determined contrast scale is 0.000198 to 0.000177 cm^-1 HU^-1 in the effective photon energy range of 58.5 to 77 keV. The contrast scale decreased as the effective photon energy increased.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.50 no.8
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• pp.1364-1371
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• 2018

An extensive investigation of photon interaction properties has been made for $Zn_xTe_{100-x}$ alloys (where x = 5, 20, 30, 40, 50) to explore its possible use in sensing and shielding gamma radiations. The results show better and stable response of ZnTe alloys for various photon interaction properties over the wide energy range, with an additional benefit of ease in fabrication due to lower melting points of Zn and Te. Mass attenuation coefficient values show strong dependence on photon energy as well as composition. Effective atomic number has maximum value for $Zn_5Te_{95}$ and lowest for $Zn_{50}Te_{50}$ in the entire energy region. The alloy sample with maximum $Z_{eff}$ shows minimal value of $N_e$ and vice versa. Mean free path follows inverse trend as observed for mass attenuation coefficient. The exposure and energy absorption buildup factors depend upon photon energy, penetration thickness and composition (effective atomic number) of $Zn_xTe_{100-x}$ alloys. It finds its application for sensing and shielding from highly energetic and highly penetrating photons at sites where radioactive materials were used and visibility of material is not a big constraint. Further, energy down conversion property of ZnTe alloys with subsequent emission in green band suggests its potential use in sensing gamma photons.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.2
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• pp.701-708
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• 2022

The mass attenuation coefficients (μ_m) of polyethylene glycol (PEG) of different molecular weights (1000-200,000) were measured using single-beam photon transmission. The X-ray fluorescent (XRF) photons from Zinc (Zn), Zirconium (Zr), Molybdenum (Mo), Silver (Ag) and Cadmium (Cd) targets were used to determine the attenuation of gamma radiation of energy range between 8.67 and 23.19 keV in PEG samples. The results were compared to theoretical values using XCOM and Monte Carlo simulation using Geant4 toolkit which was developed to validate the experiment at those certain energies. The mass attenuation coefficients were then used to compute the effective atomic numbers, electron density and half value layers for the studied samples. The outcomes showed good agreement between experimental and simulated results with those calculated theoretically by XCOM within 5% deviation. The PEG 1000 sample showed slightly higher μ_m value compared with the other samples. The dependence of the photon energy and PEG composition on the values of μ_m and HVL were investigated and discussed. In addition, the values of Z_eff and N_eff for all PEG samples behaved similarly in the given photon energy range, and they decreased as the photon energy increased.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.61-66
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• 2022

The purpose of this study is to derive photon energy fluence and mass energy absorption coefficient for 1 Gy of absorbed dose of water in brachytherapy using an Ir¹⁹² source. From the radiotherapy physics written by Khan, the half-value of lead for the gamma ray beam of the Ir¹⁹² source was obtained. The linear attenuation coefficient and the mass attenuation coefficient were calculated from the obtained half-value layer of lead. By matching the calculated lead mass attenuation coefficient with the NIST mass attenuation coefficient data, the photon energy of the matching mass attenuation coefficient was determined as the effective energy. By matching the determined effective energy with the photon energy of the NIST data on the mass energy absorption coefficient of water, the mass energy absorption coefficient of water was obtained as 0.03273 cm²/g(32.73 cm²/kg). The photon energy fluence was calculated as 0.03055 J/cm² by dividing the obtained mass energy absorption coefficient (32.73 cm²/kg) by the absorbed dose of water 1 Gy.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.49 no.8
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• pp.1758-1771
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• 2017

In this study, to determine the most effective alloy for shielding against gamma-rays, the gamma-ray shielding parameters of six types of cerrobend alloys have been investigated. Gamma-ray interaction with the cerrobend alloys has been discussed mainly in terms of total mass attenuation coefficient (${\mu}_t$), half value layer (HVL), tenth value layer (TVL), effective atomic number ($Z_{eff}$), and effective electron density ($N_{eff}$). These parameters have been calculated by theoretical approach using the ParShield program in a photon energy range between 0.1 MeV and 100 GeV. The dependence of these parameters on the incident photon energy and chemical composition of the cerrobend alloys has been studied.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.869-875
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• 2021

The purpose of this study is to derive a formula for calculating the effective energy of an X-ray beam generated by a CT simulator. Under 90, 120, and 140 kVp X-ray beams, the CT number calibration insert part of the AAPM CT performance phantom was scanned 5 times with a CT simulator. The CT numbers of polyethylene, polystyrene, water, nylon, polycarbonate, and acrylic were measured for each CT slice image. The average value of CT number measured under a single tube voltage and the linear attenuation coefficients corresponding to each photon energy calculated from the data of the National Institute of Standards and Technology were linearly fitted. Among the obtained correlation coefficients, the photon energy having the maximum value was determined as the effective energy. In this way, the effective energy of the X-ray beam generated at each tube voltage was determined. By linearly fitting the determined effective energies(y) and tube voltages(x), y=0.33026x+30.80263 as an effective energy calculation formula was induced.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.51 no.8
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• pp.2005-2012
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• 2019

This work investigated the radiation attenuation characteristics of three series of tellurite glass systems with the following compositions: 30PbO-10ZnO-xTeO₂-(60-x)B₂O₃ where x = 10, 30, 40, 50 and 60 mol%, xBaO-xB₂O₃-(100-2x)TeO₂ with x = 15-40 mol% and 50ZnO-(50-x)P₂O₅-xTeO₂, where x = 0, 10, .40 mol%. The results revealed that the attenuation parameters in all the samples decrease with increase in the energy, which implied that all the samples have better interaction with gamma photons at low energies and thus higher photon attenuating efficiency. From the three systems, the samples coded as PbZnBTe60, BaBTe70 and ZnPTe40 have the lowest half value layer values and accordingly have superior photon attenuation efficacy. The maximum effective atomic number values were found for energy less than 0.1 MeV particularly near the K-edges absorption of the heavy atomic number elements such as Te, Ba and Pb. At the lowest energy, the Z_eff values are found in the range of 62.33-66.25, 49.43-50.81 and 24.99-35.83 for series 1-3 respectively. Also, we found that the density of the glass remarkably affects the photon attenuation ability of the selected glasses. The mean free path results showed that the PbO-ZnO-TeO₂-B₂O₃ glass system has better radiation shielding efficiency than the glass samples in series 2 and 3.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.9
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• pp.3441-3449
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• 2023

We determined the radiation shielding properties for 10CaO-xPbO-(90-x) deteriorated silica gel (DSG) glass system (x = 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, and 45 mol.%). The mass attenuation coefficient (MAC) has been estimated at photon energies of 74.23, 97.12, 122, 662, 1173, and 1332 keV using a narrow beam X-ray attenuation and transmission experiment, the XCOM program, and a PHITS simulation. The obtained MAC values were applied to estimate the half value layer (HVL), mean free path (MFP), effective atomic number, and effective electron density. Results show that the MAC value of the studied glasses ranges between 0.0549 and 1.4415 cm²/g, increases with the amount of PbO, and decreases with increasing photon energy. The HVL and MFP values decrease with increasing PbO content and increase with increasing photon energy. The recycled glass, with the addition of PbO content (20-45 mol.%), exhibited excellent radiation shielding capabilities compared to standard barite and ferrite concretes and some glass systems. Moreover, the experimental radiation shielding parameters agree with the XCOM and PHITS values. This study suggests that this new waste-recycled glass is an effective and cost-saving candidate for X-ray and gamma-ray shielding applications.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.5
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• pp.1747-1753
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• 2022

Compton imaging is the main method for locating radioactive hot spots emitting high-energy gamma-ray photons. In particular, this imaging method is crucial when the photon energy is too high for coded-mask aperture imaging methods to be effective or when a large field of view is required. Reconstruction of the photon source requires advanced Compton event processing algorithms to determine the exact position of the source. In this study, we introduce a novel method based on a Deep Learning algorithm with a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to perform Compton imaging. This algorithm is trained on simulated data and tested on real data acquired with Caliste, a single planar CdTe pixelated detector. We show that performance in terms of source location accuracy is equivalent to state-of-the-art algorithms, while computation time is significantly reduced and sensitivity is improved by a factor of ~5 in the Caliste configuration.