• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.66-72
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• 2018

The proper position of a multi-leaf collimator (MLC) is essential for the quality of intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) and volumetric modulated arc radiotherapy (VMAT) dose delivery. Task Group (TG) 142 provides a quality assurance (QA) procedure for MLC position. Our study investigated the QA validation of the mechanical leaf gap measurement and the maintenance procedure. Two $VitalBeam^{TM}$ systems were evaluated to validate the acceptance of an MLC position. The dosimetric leaf gaps (DLGs) were measured for 6 MV, 6 MVFFF, 10 MV, and 15 MV photon beams. A solid water phantom was irradiated using $10{\times}10cm^2$ field size at source-to-surface distance (SSD) of 90 cm and depth of 10 cm. The portal dose image prediction (PDIP) calculation was implemented on a treatment planning system (TPS) called $Eclipse^{TM}$. A total of 20 VMAT plans were used to confirm the accuracy of dose distribution measured by an electronic portal imaging device (EPID) and those predicted by VMAT plans. The measured leaf gaps were 0.30 mm and 0.35 mm for VitalBeam 1 and 2, respectively. The DLG values decreased by an average of 6.9% and 5.9% after mechanical MLC adjustment. Although the passing rates increased slightly, by 1.5% (relative) and 1.2% (absolute) in arc 1, the average passing rates were still within the good dose delivery level (>95%). Our study shows the existence of a mechanical leaf gap error caused by a degenerated MLC motor. This can be recovered by reinitialization of MLC position on the machine control panel. Consequently, the QA procedure should be performed regularly to protect the MLC system.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.77-82
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• 1986

Determination of the relation between the kerma(Kinetic Energy Released in Material) and the absorbed dose is one of the basic problems of dosimetry. Kerma and absorbed dose were measured for 6 MV X-ray from the high energy medical linear accelerator and $^{60}Co$ gamma-ray. The experimental results show that the absorbed dose in the transient equilibrium region practically coincide with the kerma in water and Al for $^{60}Co$. The maximum dose depths were $1.45g/cm^2$ for 6MV X-ray and $0.48g/cm^2\;for\;^{60}Co$ gamma-ray. The ratios of the absorbed dose at maximum build-up to the collision kerma at the surface, ($K^{att}$), were 0.949 for 6MV X-ray and 0.992 for $^{60}Co$ gamma-ray. No difference was found between water and Al when the standard field size was used. This results show that the dependence of $K^{att}$ on the material is very small.

• The Journal of Korean Society for Radiation Therapy
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.69-77
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• 1998

When a high energy photon beam is used to treat lesions located in the upper respiratory air passages or in maxillary sinus, the beams often must traverse an air cavity before it reaches the lesion. Because of this traversal of air, it is not clear that the surface layers of the lesion forming the air-tumor tissue interface will be in a state of near electronic equilibrium; if they are not, underdosing of these layers could result. Although dose corrections at large distances beyond an air cavity are accountable by attenuation differences, perturbations at air-tissue interfaces are complex to measure or calculate. This problem has been investigated for 4MV and 10MV X-ray beams which are becoming widely available for radiotherapy with linear accelerator. Markus chamber was used for measurement with variouse air cavity geometries in X-ray beams. Underdosing effects occur at both the distal and proximal air cavity interface. The magnitude depended on geometry, energy, field sizes and distance from the air-tissue interfaces. As the cavity thickness increased, the central axis dose at the distal interface decreased. Increasing field size remedied the underdosing, as did the introduction of lateral walls. Fellowing a $20{\times}2{\times}2\;cm^3$\;air\;cavity,\;4{\times}4\;cm\;field\;there\;was\;an\;11.5\%\;and\;13\%\;underdose\;at\;the\;distal\;interface,\;while\;a\;20{\times}20{\times}2\;cm^3\;air\;cavity\;yielded\;a\;24\%\;and\;29\%$ loss for the 4MV and 10MV beams, respectively. The losses were slightly larger for the 10MV beams. The measurements reported here can be used to guide the development of new calculation models under non-equilibrium conditions. This situation is of clinical concern when lesions such as larynx and maxillary carcinoma beyond air cavities are irradiated.

• Journal of radiological science and technology
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• v.35 no.3
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• pp.265-273
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• 2012

Aquisition of accurate beam data is very important to calculate a reliable dose distribution of the treatment planning system for small radiation fields in intensity-modulated radiation therapy(IMRT) and stereotactic radiosurgery(SRS). For the measurement of small fields, the choice of a suitable detector is important due to the shape gradient in profile penumbra, the lack of lateral electronic equilibrium, and the effect of effective detector volume. Therefore, this study was to analyze the dosimetric characteristics of various detectors in measurement of beam data for small fields of linear accelerator. 0.01cc and 0.13cc ion chambers (CC01 and CC13) and a stereotactic diode detector(SFD) were used for measurement of small fields. The beam data, including the percent depth dose, output factor, and beam profile were acquired under 6 MV and 15 MV photon beams. Measurements were performed with the field size ranging from $2{\times}2cm^2$ to $5{\times}5cm^2$. For $2{\times}2cm^2$ field size, the differences of the ratios of $PDD_{20}$ and $PDD_{10}$ measured by CC01 and SFD detectors were 1.02% and 0.12% for 6 MV and 15 MV photon beams, respectively. For field sizes larger than $3{\times}3cm^2$, the differences of values of $PDD_{20}/PDD_{10}$ obtained from each detector were 1.15% and 0.71% for 6 MV and 15 MV photon beams, respectively. The output factors obtained from CC01 and SFD for $2{\times}2cm^2$ field size were within 0.5% and 1.5% for 6 MV and 15 MV, respectively. The differences in output factor of three detectors for $3{\times}3cm^2$ to $5{\times}5cm^2$ field sizes were within 0.5%. Profile penumbras measured by the SFD, CC01, and CC13 detectors at three depths were average 2.7 mm and 3.5 mm, 3.4 mm and 4.3 mm, and 5.2 mm and 6.1 mm for 6 MV and 15 MV photon beams, respectively. In conclusion, it could be possible to use of the CC01 and SFD detectors for the measurement of percent depth dose and output factor for $2{\times}2cm^2$ field size, and to use of three detectors for $3{\times}3cm^2$ to $5{\times}5cm^2$ field sizes. CC01 and SFD detectors, consider ably smaller than the radiation field, should be used in order to accurately measure the profile penumbra for small field sizes.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.41 no.1
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• pp.41-47
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• 2016

Background: For the accurate dose assessment in radiation therapy, energy spectrum of the photon beam generated from the linac head is essential. The aim of this study is to develop the technique to accurately unfolding the energy spectrum with the transmission analysis method. Materials and Methods: Clinical linear accelerator and Monet Carlo method was employed to evaluate the transmission signals according to the thickness of the observer material, and then the response function of the ion chamber response was determined with the mono energy beam. Finally the energy spectrum was unfolded with HEPROW program. Elekta Synergy Flatform and Geant4 tool kits was used in this study. Results and Discussion: In the comparison between calculated and measured transmission signals using aluminum alloy as an attenuator, root mean squared error was 0.43%. In the comparison between unfolded spectrum using HEPROW program and calculated spectrum using Geant4, the difference of peak and mean energy were 0.066 and 0.03 MeV, respectively. However, for the accurate prediction of the energy spectrum, additional experiment with various type of material and improvement of the unfolding program is required. Conclusion: In this research, it is demonstrated that unfolding spectra technique could be used in megavoltage photon beam with aluminum alloy and HEPROW program.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.153-159
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• 2015

This study is to evaluate thedosiemtric leaf gap (DLG) at different depths for dynamic intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) in order to evaluate the absolute dose and dose distribution according to the different positions of tumors and compare the measured and planned the multileaf collimator (MLC) transmission factor (T.F.) and DLG values. We used the 6 MV and 15 MV photon beam from linear accelerator with a Millenium 120 MLC system. After the import the DICOM RT files, we measured the absolute dose at different depths (2 cm, 5 cm, 10 cm, and 15 cm) to calculate the MLC T. F. and DLG. For 6 MV photon beam, the measured both MLC T. F. and DLG were increased with the increase the measured depths. When applying to treatment planning systemas fixed transmission factor with its value measured under the reference condition at depth of 5 cm, although the difference fixed and varied transmission factor is not significant, the dosiemtric effect could be presented according to the depth that the tumor is placed. Therefore, we are planning to investigate the treatment planning system whichthe T. F. and DLG factor according to at the different depths can be applied in the patient-specific treatment plan.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.41-46
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• 1999

There is necessity for making a smaller and more sensitive detector in small field sizes. This report assesses the suitability of metal-loaded thermoluminescent dosimeters for this purpose. Measurements were performed in the 6 MV photon and 6 MeV electron beams of a medical linear accelerator with LiF thermoluminescence dosimeters (TLD-100) embedded in solid water phantom. TLD-100 chips(surface area 3.2 $\times$ 3.2 $\textrm{mm}^2$) loaded with a metal plate(Tin or gold respectively) were used to enhance dose readings to TLD-100. Surface dose was measured for field size 10 $\times$ 10 $\textrm{cm}^2$ and 100 em SSD. Measurements have been made of the enhanced signal intensity and good linearity for absorbed dose with each metal. Using a 1 mm each metal on TLD-l00 in the beam increased the surface dose to 14% and 56% respectively for 6MV photon. In the case of 6 MeV electron, gold plate enhanced the TL response to 13%, but there is no difference for tin plate. The specific dose response of TLD-100 with thin metal plate increases with electron concentration of metal film, this is most likely due to increased electron scattered from the additional material with electron density higher than TLD-100. This emphasizes the role of TL dosimeters with metal as amplified dosimeters for therapeutic high energy x-ray beams. Due to the enhanced dose reading of TLD-100 with metal plate, it could be possible to develop smaller TL dosimeter with high sensitivity.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.91-99
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• 2000

This is a preliminary study for developing the method of the dose reconstruction in the patients, irradiated by mega-voltage photon beams from the linear accelerator, using the transit dose distributions. In this study we present the method of three-dimensional dose reconstruction and evaluate the method by computer simulation. To acquire the dose distributions in the patients (or phantoms) we first calculate the differences between the doses at the arbitrary points in the patients and the doses at the corresponding points where the transit doses are measured. Then, we can get the dose in the patients from the measured transit dose and the calculated value of the difference. The dose differences are calculated by applying the inverse square law and using the linear attenuation coefficient. The scatter to primary dose ratios, which are calculated by the Monte Carlo program using the CT data of the patient (or phantoms), are also used in the calculations. For the evaluation of this method we used various kinds of homogeneous and inhomogeneous phantoms and calculated the transit dose distributions with the Monte Carlo program. From the distributions we reconstructed the dose distributions in the phantom. We used mono-energy Photon beam of 1.5MeV and Monte Carlo program EGS4. The comparison between the dose distributions reconstructed using the method and the distributions calculated by the Monte Carlo program was done. They agreed within errors of -4%∼+2%. This method can be used to predict the dose distributions in the patient

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.175-179
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• 2016

In this study, we evaluated the reusable leuco malachite green (LMG) micelle gel properties dependent on various components of chemical concentration and compared with leuco crystal violet (LCV). The gels were delivered to 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 Gy at 6 MV photon beam from linear accelerator and analyzed using spectrophotometry. We confirmed that the reusable LMG and LVC absorbance wavelength peak were made up at 630 nm and 600 nm respectively. The transparency of reusable LMG decreased with higher amount of trichloroacetic acid (TCAA) and lower reusable LMG dyes. 1 mM reusable LMG was the lowest transparency. The sensitivity was increased depending on lower trichloroacetic acid (TCAA) concentrations and the amount of suitable surfactant (Triton X-100), which was found to be 7 mM. However, we were not able to investigate sensitivity effects factor from reusable LMG dyes. The gel dosimeter containing 16 mM TCAA, 7 mM Triton X-100 gel dosimeter showed the highest sensitivity at $0.0021{\pm}0.0001cm^{-1}.Gy^{-1}$. The sensitivity of LCV was found to be higher than reusable LMG at $0.0037{\pm}0.0005cm^{-1}.Gy^{-1}$. The reusable LMG and LCV dose responses were shown to be $R^2=0.997$, $R^2=0.999$ respectively, as stable measurement results. Future research is necessary to improve dose sensitivity, dose rate dependency and gel fading with extensive chemical formulations.

• The Journal of Korean Society for Radiation Therapy
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.88-93
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• 1998

Multileaf collimator is essential equipment in conformal radiation therapy, however the use is limitted by increase of penumbra width and undulating dose distribution at the field edge. The purpose of this study is to improve the penumbra and dose distribution in the multileaf collimator field edge. Measurement were performed with X-omat V film in solid water phantom using 6MV photon beam from Siemens linear accelerator. All the measurement were made along the central axis of $5{\times}5cm,\;10{\times}10cm$ circular field for constant SSD of 100 cm. To improve the penumbra and dose distribution collimator was rotated by 15 degrees from 0 to 90 degrees (collimator rotation method) and center was shifted to the longitudinal direction by fourth of lead width (center shift method). We compare the penumbra and dose distribution at the field edge to alloy block. Dose distribution and penumbra width at the feild edge of MLC showed undulated dose pattern and increased penumbra compared with alloy block. However, in the collimator rotation method and center shift method we abtained simular results with alloy block. Through the study we expected that clinical use of MLC will be increase.