Pages: 23 - 26

Authors: Joanne BEEBE-WANG, Avraham F. DILMANIAN, Stephen G. PEGGS, David J. SCHLYER, and Paul VASKA

Abstract

Proton therapy is a treatment modality of increasing utility in clinical radiation oncology mostly because its dose distribution conforms more tightly to the target volume than X-ray radiation therapy. One important feature of proton therapy is that it produces a small amount of positron-emitting isotopes along the beam-path through the non-elastic nuclear interaction of protons with target nuclei such as ¹²C, ¹⁴N, and ¹⁶O. These radioisotopes, mainly ¹¹C, ¹³N, and ¹⁵O, allow imaging the therapy dose distribution using positron emission tomography. The resulting positron emission tomography images provide a powerful tool for quality assurance of the treatment, especially when treating inhomogeneous organs such as the lungs or the head-and-neck, where the calculation of the dose distribution for treatment planning is more difficult. This paper uses Monte Carlo simulations to predict the yield of positron emitters produced by a 250 MeV proton beam, and to simulate the productions of the image in a clinical PET scanner.

Key words: proton therapy, positron emission tomography, Monte Carlo simulation

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