• Radiation Oncology Journal
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.42-49
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• 2015

Purpose: In order to keep the acceptable level of the radiation oncology linear accelerators, it is necessary to apply a reliable quality assurance (QA) program. Materials and Methods: The QA protocols, published by authoritative organizations, such as the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM), determine the quality control (QC) tests which should be performed on the medical linear accelerators and the threshold levels for each test. The purpose of this study is to increase the accuracy and precision of the selected QC tests in order to increase the quality of treatment and also increase the speed of the tests to convince the crowded centers to start a reliable QA program. A new method has been developed for two of the QC tests; optical distance indicator (ODI) QC test as a daily test and gantry angle QC test as a monthly test. This method uses an image processing approach utilizing the snapshots taken by the CCD camera to measure the source to surface distance (SSD) and gantry angle. Results: The new method of ODI QC test has an accuracy of 99.95% with a standard deviation of 0.061 cm and the new method for gantry angle QC has a precision of $0.43^{\circ}$. The automated proposed method which is used for both ODI and gantry angle QC tests, contains highly accurate and precise results which are objective and the human-caused errors have no effect on the results. Conclusion: The results show that they are in the acceptable range for both of the QC tests, according to AAPM task group 142.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.99-106
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• 2021

Purpose: In this study, we aimed to manufacture a patient-specific gel phantom combining three-dimensional (3D) printing and polymer gel and evaluate the radiation dose and dose profile using gel dosimetry. Methods: The patient-specific head phantom was manufactured based on the patient's computed tomography (CT) scan data to create an anatomically replicated phantom; this was then produced using a ColorJet 3D printer. A 3D polymer gel dosimeter called RTgel-100 is contained inside the 3D printing head phantom, and irradiation was performed using a 6 MV LINAC (Varian Clinac) X-ray beam, a linear accelerator for treatment. The irradiated phantom was scanned using magnetic resonance imaging (Siemens) with a magnetic field of 3 Tesla (3T) of the Korea Institute of Nuclear Medicine, and then compared the irradiated head phantom with the dose calculated by the patient's treatment planning system (TPS). Results: The comparison between the Hounsfield unit (HU) values of the CT image of the patient and those of the phantom revealed that they were almost similar. The electron density value of the patient's bone and brain was 996±167 HU and 58±15 HU, respectively, and that of the head phantom bone and brain material was 986±25 HU and 45±17 HU, respectively. The comparison of the data of TPS and 3D gel revealed that the difference in gamma index was 2%/2 mm and the passing rate was within 95%. Conclusions: 3D printing allows us to manufacture variable density phantoms for patient-specific dosimetric quality assurance (DQA), develop a customized body phantom of the patient in the future, and perform a patient-specific dosimetry with film, ion chamber, gel, and so on.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.45-53
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• 2019

This study is a neutron activation for concrete that shields medical linear accelerator facilities. Comparison of general concrete and low activation concrete. The simulation method was simulated using MCNPX (Ver. 2.5.0) and FISPACT-2010, and the shielding ability for photon and neutron beams was calculated and neutron activation evaluation was carried out. As a result, the shielding capacity was 20 ~ 50 cm efficient in general concrete, and activate evaluation in low activation concrete was calculated to be low in radioactivity concrete, but all were estimated to not exceed their own allowable concentration in self - disposal. As a result of the comprehensive analysis, it is considered effective to use ordinary concrete.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.121-128
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• 1991

Radiosurgery treatment in the brain requires detailed information on three-dimensional dose distribution. A three-dimensional treatment planning is a prerequisite for treatment plan optimization. It must cover 3-D methods for representing the patient, the dose distributions, and beam settings. Three-dimensional dose models for non-coplanar moving arcs were developed using measured single beam data and efficient 3-D dose algorithms for circular fields. The implementation of three dimensional dose algorithms with stereotactic radiosurgery and the application of the algorithms to several cases are discussed.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.49-53
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• 2017

The energy distribution was calculated for an electron beam from an electron linear accelerator developed for medical applications using computational methods. The depth dose data for monoenergetic electrons from 0.1 MeV to 8.0 MeV were calculated by the DOSXYZ/nrc code. The calculated data were used to generate the energy distribution from the measured depth dose data by numerical iterations. The measured data in a previous work and an in-house computer program were used for the generation of energy distribution. As results, the mean energy and most probable energy of the energy distribution were 5.7 MeV and 6.2 MeV, respectively. These two values agreed with those determined by the IAEA dosimetry protocol using the measured depth dose.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.223-228
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• 2015

Double-focused micro-Multileaf Collimator (${\mu}MLC$) is able to create radiation fields having sharper dose gradients at the field edges than common MLC. Therefore, ${\mu}MLC$ has been used for the stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) and Stereotactic Radiotherapy (SRT). We evaluated the dosimetric characteristics of a doublefocused Dynamic-${\mu}MLC$ (DMLC) attached to the Elekta Synergy linear accelerator. For this study, the dosimetric parameters including, Percent Depth Dose (PDD), Leaf leakage and penumbra, have been measured by using of the radiochromic films (GafChromic EBT2), EDGE diode detector and three-dimensional water phantom. All datas were measured on 6 MV x-ray. As a result, The DMLC shows transmission below to 1% and because of double-focused construction of the DMLC, the penumbras of fields with DMLC are independent from the field sizes. In this paper, the resulting dosimetric evaluations proved the applicability of the DMLC attached to the Elekta Synergy linear accelerator.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.1685-1689
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• 2016

Physical wedges still can be used as missing tissue compensators or filters to alter the shape of isodose curves in a target volume to reach an optimal radiotherapy plan without creating a hotspot. The aim of this study was to investigate the dosimetric properties of physical wedges filters such as off-axis photon fluence, photon spectrum, output factor and half value layer. The photon beam quality of a 6 MV Primus Siemens modified by 150 and 450 physical wedges was studied with BEAMnrc Monte Carlo (MC) code. The calculated present depth dose and dose profile curves for open and wedged photon beam were in good agreement with the measurements. Increase of wedge angle increased the beam hardening and this effect was more pronounced at the heal region. Using such an accurate MC model to determine of wedge factors and implementation of it as a calculation algorithm in the future treatment planning systems is recommended.

• The Journal of Korean Society for Radiation Therapy
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.91-104
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• 2000

Recently linear accelerator in radiation therapy in asymmetric field has been easily used since the improvement and capability of asymmetrical field adjustment attached to the machine. It has been thought there have been some significant errors in dose calculation when asymmetrical radiation fields have been utilized in practice of radiation treatments if the fundamental data for dose calculation have been measured in symmetrical standard fields. This study investigated how much the measured data of dose distributions and their isodose curves are different between in asymmetrical and symmetrical standard fields, and how much there difference affect the error in dose calculation in conventional method measured in symmetrical standard field. The distributions of radiation dose were measured by photon diode detector in the water phantom (RFA-300P, Scanditronix, Sweden) as tissue equivalent material on utilization of 6 MV linear accelerator with source surface distance (SSD) 1000 mm. The photon diode detector has the velocity of 1 mm per second from water surface to 250 mm depth in the field size of $40mm{\times}40mm\;to\;250mm{\times}250mm\;symmetric\;field\;and\;40mm{\times}20mm\;to\;250mm{\times}125mm$ asymmetrical fields. The measurements of percent depth dose (PDD) and subsequent plotting of their isodose curves were performed from water surface to 250mm dmm from Y-center axis in $100mm{\times}50mm$ field in order to absence the variability of depth dose according to increasing field sizes and their affects to plotted isodose curves. The difference of PDD between symmetric and asymmetric field was maximum $4.1\%\;decrease\;in\;40mm{\times}20mm\;field,\;maximum\;6.6\%\;decrease\;in\;100mm{\times}50mm\;and\;maximum\;10.2\%\;decrease\;200mm{\times}100mm$, the larger decrease difference of PDD as the greater field size and as greater the depth, The difference of PDD between asymmetrical field and equivalent square field showed maximum $2.4\%\;decrease\;in\;60mm{\times}30mm\;field,\;maximum\;4.8\%\;decrease\;in\;150mm{\times}75mm\;and\;maximum\;6.1\%\;decrease\;in\;250mm{\times}125mm$, and the larger decreased differenced PDD as the greater field size and as greater the depth, these differences of PDD were out of $5\%$ of dose calculation as defined by international Commission on radiation unit and Measurements(ICRU). In the dose distribution of asymmetrical field (half beam) the plotted isodose curves were observed to have deviations by decreased PDD as greater as the blocking of the beam moved closer to the central axis, and as the asymmetrical field increased by moving the block 10 mm keeping away from the central axis, the PDD increased and plotted isodose curves were gradually more flattened, due to reduced amount of the primary beam and the fraction of low energy soft radiations by passing thougepth in asymmetrical field by moving independent jaw each 10 h beam flattening filter. As asymmetrical radiation field as half beam radiation technique is used, the radiation dosimetry calculated in utilizing the fundamental data which measured in standard symmetrical field should be converted on bases of nearly measured data in asymmetrical field, measured beam data flies of various asymmetrical field in various energy and be necessary in each institution.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.127-136
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• 1998

On-line geometrical quality assurance system has been developed using electronic portal imaging system(OQuE). EPID system is networked into Pentium PC in order to transmit the acquisited images to analysis PC. Geometrical QA parameters, including light-radiation field congruence, collimator rotation axis, and gantry rotation axis can be easily analyzed with the help of graphic user interface(GUI) software. Equipped with the EPID (Portal Vision, Varian, USA), geometrical quality assurance of a linear accelerator (CL/2100/CD, Varian, USA), which is networked into OQuE, was performed to evaluate this system. Light-radiation field congruence tests by center of gravity analysis shows 0.2～0.3mm differences for various field sizes. Collimator (or Gantry) rotation axis for various angles could be obtained by superposing 4 shots of angles. The radius of collimator rotation axis is measured to 0.2mm for upper jaw collimator, and 0.1mm for lower jaw. Acquisited images for various gantry angles were rotated according to the gantry angle and actual center of image point obtained from collimator axis test. The rotated images are superpositioned and analyzed as the same method as collimator rotation axis. The radius of gantry rotation axis is calculated 0.3mm for anterior/posterior direction (gantry 0$^{\circ}$ and 170$^{\circ}$) and 0.7mm for right/left direction(gantry 90$^{\circ}$ and 260$^{\circ}$). Image acquisition for data analysis is faster than conventional method and the results turn out to be excellent for the development goal and accurate within a milimeter range. The OQuE system is proven to be a good tool for the geometrical quality assurance of linear accelerator using EPID.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.61-68
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• 1990

We have designed the calculation model(AMC method) of electron output for the cut-out fieldsand studied the influence of shielding block size. The output of electron was measured in the water phantom at dmax, for 20 $\times$ 20cm$^2$ cone size electron beams from CL/1800 linear accelerator(Varian, USA), Which generates the energy of 6, 9, 12, 15 and 18MeV electron beams. The shielding blocks were rectangular or squre shaped, low melting point alloy. We can predict the output from the arbitrarily rectangular shaped block within 1% error. by using the AMC method, which considers the contribution of the collimator(block) scatter and the phantom scatter.