Auto-commissioning of a Monte Carlo electron beam model with application to photon MLC shaped electron fields

Objective.Presently electron beam treatments are delivered using dedicated applicators. An alternative is the usage of the already installed photon multileaf collimator (pMLC) enabling efficient electron treatments. Currently, the commissioning of beam models is a manual and time-consuming process. In this work an auto-commissioning procedure for the Monte Carlo (MC) beam model part representing the beam above the pMLC is developed for TrueBeam systems with electron energies from 6 to 22 MeV.Approach.The analytical part of the electron beam model includes a main source representing the primary beam and a jaw source representing the head scatter contribution each consisting of an electron and a photon component, while MC radiation transport is performed for the pMLC. The auto-commissioning of this analytical part relies on information pre-determined from MC simulations, in-air dose profiles and absolute dose measurements in water for different field sizes and source to surface distances (SSDs). For validation calculated and measured dose distributions in water were compared for different field sizes, SSDs and beam energies for eight TrueBeam systems. Furthermore, a sternum case in an anthropomorphic phantom was considered and calculated and measured dose distributions were compared at different SSDs.Main results.Instead of the manual commissioning taking up to several days of calculation time and several hours of user time, the auto-commissioning is carried out in a few minutes. Measured and calculated dose distributions agree generally within 3% of maximum dose or 2 mm. The gamma passing rates for the sternum case ranged from 96% to 99% (3% (global)/2 mm criteria, 10% threshold).Significance.The auto-commissioning procedure was successfully implemented and applied to eight TrueBeam systems. The newly developed user-friendly auto-commissioning procedure allows an efficient commissioning of an MC electron beam model and eases the usage of advanced electron radiotherapy utilizing the pMLC for beam shaping.

Estimation of photoneutron yield in linear accelerator with different collimation systems by Geant4 and MCNPX simulation codes

At present, the bremsstrahlung photon beams produced by linear accelerators are the most commonly employed method of radiotherapy for tumor treatments. A photoneutron source based on three different energies (6, 10 and 15 MeV) of a linac electron beam was designed by means of Geant4 and Monte Carlo N-Particle eXtended (MCNPX) simulation codes. To obtain maximum neutron yield, two arrangements for the photo neutron convertor were studied: (a) without a collimator, and (b) placement of the convertor after the collimator. The maximum photon intensities in tungsten were 0.73, 1.24 and 2.07 photon/e at 6, 10 and 15 MeV, respectively. There was no considerable increase in the photon fluence spectra from 6 to 15 MeV at the optimum thickness between 0.8 mm and 2 mm of tungsten. The optimum dimensions of the collimator were determined to be a length of 140 mm with an aperture of 5 mm  ×  70 mm for iron in a slit shape. According to the neutron yield, the best thickness obtained for the studied materials was 30 mm. The number of neutrons generated in BeO achieved the maximum value at 6 MeV, unlike that in Be, where the highest number of neutrons was observed at 15 MeV. Statistical uncertainty in all simulations was less than 0.3% and 0.05% for MCNPX and the standard electromagnetic (EM) physics packages of Geant4, respectively. Differences among spectra in various regions are due to various cross-section and stopping power data and different simulations of the physics processes.