Beam-on imaging of short-lived positron emitters during proton therapy
Beam-on imaging of short-lived positron emitters during proton therapy
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DOI:
10.1088/1361-6560/aa6b8c
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发表时间:
2017-06-21
影响因子:
3.5
通讯作者:
Dendooven, P.
中科院分区:
文献类型:
--
作者:
Buitenhuis, H. J. T.;Diblen, F.;Dendooven, P.
In vivo dose delivery verification in proton therapy can be performed by positron emission tomography (PET) of the positron-emitting nuclei produced by the proton beam in the patient. A PET scanner installed in the treatment position of a proton therapy facility that takes data with the beam on will see very short-lived nuclides as well as longer-lived nuclides. The most important short-lived nuclide for proton therapy is N-12 (Dendooven et al 2015 Phys. Med. Biol. 60 8923-47), which has a half-life of 11 ms. The results of a proof-of-principle experiment of beam-on PET imaging of short-lived N-12 nuclei are presented. The Philips Digital Photon Counting Module TEK PET system was used, which is based on LYSO scintillators mounted on digital SiPM photosensors. A 90 MeV proton beam from the cyclotron at KVI-CART was used to investigate the energy and time spectra of PET coincidences during beam-on. Events coinciding with proton bunches, such as prompt gamma rays, were removed from the data via an anti-coincidence filter with the cyclotron RF. The resulting energy spectrum allowed good identification of the 511 keV PET counts during beam-on. A method was developed to subtract the long-lived background from the N-12 image by introducing a beam-off period into the cyclotron beam time structure. We measured 2D images and 1D profiles of the N-12 distribution. A range shift of 5 mm was measured as 6 +/- 3 mm using the N-12 profile. A larger, more efficient, PET system with a higher data throughput capability will allow beam-on N-12 PET imaging of single spots in the distal layer of an irradiation with an increased signal-to-background ratio and thus better accuracy. A simulation shows that a large dual panel scanner, which images a single spot directly after it is delivered, can measure a 5 mm range shift with millimeter accuracy: 5.5 +/- 1.1 mm for 1 x 10(8) protons and 5.2 +/- 0.5 mm for 5 x 10(8) protons. This makes fast and accurate feedback on the dose delivery during treatment possible.