Development of dosimetry tools for proton therapy research

Dosimetry tools for proton therapy research have been developed to measure the properties of a therapeutic proton beam. A CCD camera–scintillation screen system, which can verify the 2D dose distribution of a scanning beam and can be used for proton radiography, was developed. Also developed were a large area parallel-plate ionization chamber and a multi-layer Faraday cup to monitor the beam current and to measure the beam energy, respectively. To investigate the feasibility of locating the distal dose falloff in real time during patient treatment, a prompt gamma measuring system composed of multi-layer shielding structures was then devised. The system worked well for a pristine proton beam. However, correlation between the distal dose falloff and the prompt gamma distribution was blurred by neutron background for a therapy beam formed by scattering method. We have also worked on the design of a Compton camera to image the 2D distribution of prompt gamma rays.