Massively parallelized Monte Carlo software to calculate the light propagation in arbitrarily shaped 3D turbid media (Conference Presentation)

Abstract

The Monte Carlo method is often referred as the gold standard to calculate the light propagation in turbid media. Especially for complex shaped geometries where no analytical solutions are available the Monte Carlo method becomes very important. In this work a Monte Carlo software is presented, to simulate the light propagation in complex shaped geometries. To improve the simulation time the code is based on OpenCL such that graphics cards from most vendors as well as all other computing devices can be used simultaneously. Within the software an illumination concept is presented to realize easily all kinds of light sources, like spatial frequency domain (SFD), optical fibers or Gaussian beam profiles. Moreover different objects, which are not connected to each other, can be considered simultaneously, without any additional preprocessing. A correct implementation of the Software has been proofed by comparison with well-known Monte Carlo packages like the MCML software or the MMC software package. Additionally speed comparison with these software packages are presented to demonstrate the strengths of the newly developed Monte Carlo software. Since the 3D objects are expressed by tetrahedra within the Monte Carlo software it can be used for many applications. The presented Monte Carlo software was utilized to calculate the transmission spectrum of a tooth as a clinical application. The results of the Monte Carlo software were used for the color reconstruction and prediction of different objects as an imaging function.