Beam range estimation by measuring bremsstrahlung

制動輻射の観測によるビーム飛程の測定

山口 充孝; 鳥飼 幸太*; 河地 有木; 島田 博文*; 佐藤 隆博; 長尾 悠人; 藤巻 秀; 国分 紀秀*; 渡辺 伸*; 高橋 忠幸*; 荒川 和夫*; 神谷 富裕; 中野 隆史*

Yamaguchi, Mitsutaka; Torikai, Kota*; Kawachi, Naoki; Shimada, Hirofumi*; Sato, Takahiro; Nagao, Yuto; Fujimaki, Shu; Kokubun, Motohide*; Watanabe, Shin*; Takahashi, Tadayuki*; Arakawa, Kazuo*; Kamiya, Tomihiro; Nakano, Takashi*

We describe a new method for estimating the beam range in heavy-ion radiation therapy by measuring the ion beam bremsstrahlung. We experimentally confirm that the secondary electron bremsstrahlung process provides the dominant bremsstrahlung contribution. A Monte Carlo simulation shows that the number of background photons from annihilation rays is about 1% of the bremsstrahlung strength in the low-energy region used in our estimation (63-68 keV). Agreement between the experimental results and the theoretical prediction for the characteristic shape of the bremsstrahlung spectrum validates the effectiveness of our new method in estimating the ion beam range.