Using GATE for radiation therapy applications

Abstract

Monte Carlo (MC) simulations is a standard method for studying physical processes in medical physics, worldwide. GATE is an open-source platform for simulating imaging, radiotherapy (RT) and dosimetry applications in a user-friendly environment. In RT applications, during the treatment planning, it is essential to accurately assess the deposited energy and the absorbed dose per tissue or organ of interest, as well as the local statistical uncertainty. Several types of realistic dosimetric applications are described including: molecular radiotherapy, radio-immunotherapy, brachytherapy, particle and external beam therapy. GATE is a MC toolkit which is well validated and is widely accepted by the scientific community. More specifically, it has been efficiently used in several applications, such as Dose Point Kernels, S-values, Brachytherapy parameters (anisotropy and radial dose function), and compared against a variety of MC codes which are considered as standard tools for decades. Furthermore, comparison studies reported reliable modelling of electron, photon and proton beams comparing experimental with simulated data. Personalization of medical protocols can be achieved by combining GATE MC simulations with anthropomorphic computational models and clinical anatomical data. High statistics obtained by speeding up these computationally demanding simulations (GPU, Grids, Variance Reduction Techniques, Phase-Space), can lead to accurate dosimetric assessment in clinical applications. In the present study, examples of validated RT applications are presented, describing the structure of such simulations and examples of recently funded H2020 projects (i.e. ERROR) are given. Monte Carlo (MC) simulations is a standard method for studying physical processes in medical physics, worldwide. GATE is an open-source platform for simulating imaging, radiotherapy (RT) and dosimetry applications in a user-friendly environment. In RT applications, during the treatment planning, it is essential to accurately assess the deposited energy and the absorbed dose per tissue or organ of interest, as well as the local statistical uncertainty. Several types of realistic dosimetric applications are described including: molecular radiotherapy, radio-immunotherapy, brachytherapy, particle and external beam therapy. GATE is a MC toolkit which is well validated and is widely accepted by the scientific community. More specifically, it has been efficiently used in several applications, such as Dose Point Kernels, S-values, Brachytherapy parameters (anisotropy and radial dose function), and compared against a variety of MC codes which are considered as standard tools for decades. Furthermore, comparison studies reported reliable modelling of electron, photon and proton beams comparing experimental with simulated data. Personalization of medical protocols can be achieved by combining GATE MC simulations with anthropomorphic computational models and clinical anatomical data. High statistics obtained by speeding up these computationally demanding simulations (GPU, Grids, Variance Reduction Techniques, Phase-Space), can lead to accurate dosimetric assessment in clinical applications. In the present study, examples of validated RT applications are presented, describing the structure of such simulations and examples of recently funded H2020 projects (i.e. ERROR) are given.