TY - JOUR
T1 - An Optical Fibre-Based Sensor for Real-Time Monitoring of Clinical Linear Accelerator Radiotherapy Delivery
AU - O'Keeffe, Sinead
AU - Zhao, Wenhui
AU - Sun, Weimin
AU - Zhang, Daxin
AU - Qin, Zhuang
AU - Chen, Ziyin
AU - Ma, Yu
AU - Lewis, Elfed
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 IEEE.
PY - 2016/5/1
Y1 - 2016/5/1
N2 - A novel real-time optical fibre X-Ray dosimeter for monitoring the radiation pulses delivered from a clinical linear accelerator (Linac) is presented. The primary focus of the sensor is to measure low doses of ionising X-ray radiation in real time (limited to 0.1-ms gate time of the detector). The sensor tip material scintillates upon exposure to X-ray energy and the resultant low-level visible light signal is coupled to a polymethyl methacrylate plastic optical fibre, which is used to guide it towards a distal avalanche photodiode-based detector. The detector measures the low-level scintillating light from the sensor, thereby converting the ionizing radiation energy to a measurable signal with a time resolution of 0.1 ms. Results show that the scintillating optical fibre X-ray dosimeter is capable of capturing the individual X-Ray pulses delivered by the Linac during normal operation. Further examination of the results demonstrates that the sensor is capable of measuring dose rate and, hence, dose with a linearity (R2 = 0.9995-0.9999) and in a highly repeatable manner for dose rates in the range 100 to 600 monitor units/min.
AB - A novel real-time optical fibre X-Ray dosimeter for monitoring the radiation pulses delivered from a clinical linear accelerator (Linac) is presented. The primary focus of the sensor is to measure low doses of ionising X-ray radiation in real time (limited to 0.1-ms gate time of the detector). The sensor tip material scintillates upon exposure to X-ray energy and the resultant low-level visible light signal is coupled to a polymethyl methacrylate plastic optical fibre, which is used to guide it towards a distal avalanche photodiode-based detector. The detector measures the low-level scintillating light from the sensor, thereby converting the ionizing radiation energy to a measurable signal with a time resolution of 0.1 ms. Results show that the scintillating optical fibre X-ray dosimeter is capable of capturing the individual X-Ray pulses delivered by the Linac during normal operation. Further examination of the results demonstrates that the sensor is capable of measuring dose rate and, hence, dose with a linearity (R2 = 0.9995-0.9999) and in a highly repeatable manner for dose rates in the range 100 to 600 monitor units/min.
KW - Clinical External Beam Radiotherapy
KW - Fluorescent and Luminescent Sensors
KW - Optical Fibre sensors
KW - Real Time Radiatio Dose Measurement
KW - X-ray Dosimetry
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84963701172&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/JSTQE.2015.2482945
DO - 10.1109/JSTQE.2015.2482945
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84963701172
SN - 1077-260X
VL - 22
SP - 35
EP - 42
JO - IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics
JF - IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics
IS - 3
M1 - 7286739
ER -