Secondary-Electron-Bremsstrahlung Imaging for Beam Monitoring in Proton Therapy

Abstract

Proton therapy can deliver high doses to tumors while minimizing damage to surrounding healthy tissue. Despite this physical advantage, there is a relatively large uncertainty in the actual dose distribution within the patient body. Therefore, in vivo beam monitoring is essential to fully utilize the physical advantages of proton therapy in clinical practice. Secondary-electron-bremsstrahlung (SEB) imaging has been proposed for beam monitoring in particle therapy. In this paper, we introduce the physical characteristics of SEB and show the experimental results of proton beam imaging using a dedicated low-energy X-ray camera. We also present a dose estimation method from the SEB image using a deep learning approach.