A novel range telescope concept for proton CT

• Published in: Physics in medicine & biology 2022-02, Vol.67 (3), p.35013
• Main Authors: Granado-González, M, Jesús-Valls, C, Lux, T, Price, T, Sánchez, F
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Child; CT scan; Data Collection; Humans; Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; Monte Carlo Method; Monte Carlo simulation; Phantoms, Imaging; proton CT; proton therapy; Proton Therapy - methods; Protons; range telescope; Telescopes; Tomography, X-Ray Computed - methods; tracking
• ISSN: 0031-9155; 1361-6560
• DOI: 10.1088/1361-6560/ac4b39

Proton beam therapy can potentially offer improved treatment for cancers of the head and neck and in paediatric patients. There has been a sharp uptake of proton beam therapy in recent years as improved delivery techniques and patient benefits are observed. However, treatments are currently planned using conventional x-ray CT images due to the absence of devices able to perform high quality proton computed tomography (pCT) under realistic clinical conditions. A new plastic-scintillator-based range telescope concept, named ASTRA, is proposed here to measure the proton's energy loss in a pCT system. Simulations conducted using GEANT4 yield an expected energy resolution of 0.7%. If calorimetric information is used the energy resolution could be further improved to about 0.5%. In addition, the ability of ASTRA to track multiple protons simultaneously is presented. Due to its fast components, ASTRA is expected to reach unprecedented data collection rates, similar to 10 protons/s. The performance of ASTRA has also been tested by simulating the imaging of phantoms. The results show excellent image contrast and relative stopping power reconstruction.