Radiation therapy uses ionizing radiation to treat cancerous tumors. This paper reports our experiences with the parallelization of a real-world 3-D radiation therapy treatment planning (RTTP) system on a wide range of platforms, including SMP servers, Cray J916 vector machines, and clusters of SMPs. The RTTP system is a meta-problem, comprising two major loosely-coupled components: dose calcul...

The role of positron emission tomography (PET) during the past decade has evolved rapidly from that of a pure research tool to a methodology of enormous clinical potential. (18)F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG)-PET is currently the most widely used probe in the diagnosis, staging, assessment of tumor response to treatment, and radiation therapy planning because metabolic changes generally precede the ...

This paper describes a suite of optimization tools for radiation treatment planning within the Matlab programming environment. The data included with these tools was computed for real patient cases using a Monte Carlo dose engine. The formulation of a series of optimization models is described that utilizes this data within a modeling system. Furthermore, visualization techniques are provided t...

Introduction:   Radiotherapy with or without surgery plays an important role in the treatment of patients with esophageal cancer. In the treatment planning of esophageal cancer, usually normal lung volume was observed in the treatment fields and probably received high radiation dose. The incidence of radiation pneumonitis (RP) after radiotherapy (RT) for sensitive organ of lu...

This study explores how the metal materials of the applicator influence the dose distribution when performing brachytherapy for cervical cancer. A pinpoint ionization chamber, Monte Carlo code MCNPX, and treatment planning system are used to evaluate the dose distribution for a single Ir-192 source positioned in the tandem and ovoid. For dose distribution in water with the presence of the tande...

introduction wedge modifiers are commonly applied in external beam radiotherapy to change the dose distribution corresponding to the body contour and to obtain a uniform dose distribution within the target volume. since the radiation dose delivered to the target must be within ±5% of the prescribed dose, accurate dose calculation by a treatment planning system (tps) is important. the objective ...

Background: In the radiotherapy of patients with esophagus and breast cancer, the heart receives a significant dose of radiation that might cause heart complications. Thefore, the aim of the current study was to evaluate the effects of esophagus and left breast cancer radiotherapy on the cardiac function and to determine the relationship between the dosimetric parameters and ejection fraction (...

To investigate potential dosimetric benefits and treatment efficiency of dynamic conformal arc therapy (DCA), intensity modulated radiation therapy (IMRT), and double partial arcs Rapidarc (RA) techniques in the treatment of early-stage peripheral lung cancer using stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) with flattening filter free (FFF) beams. Twenty early-stage peripheral lung cancer patients w...

Background: Accurate voxel phantom is needed for dosimetric simulation in radiation therapy for malignant tumors in female pelvic region. However, most of the existing voxel phantoms are constructed on the basis of Caucasian or non-Chinese population. Materials and Methods: A computational framework for constructing female pelvic voxel phantom for radiation dosimetry was performed base...