0000000000379535
AUTHOR
Gumersindo Verdú
A mammographic phantom image reconstruction through Monte Carlo techniques
Mammographic phantoms are employed during quality control test in breast screening locations and other health centres. These quality controls are performed to achieve the image quality required to detect breast abnormalities, ensuring the minimum risk to radiographied women. The aim of this study is the development of a methodology to reproduce the image of a mammogram during a routine exposure in a breast screening programme. In a first step, the CIRS 11A (MAMMO PHANTOM SP01) mammographic phantom has been simplified and modelled with the Monte Carlo transport code MCNP-4c2. Different tallies (F2 and F5) have been used to score the photon flux under the phantom, and a group of aluminium lay…
Evaluation of DR and CR digital mammography systems based on phantom and breast dosimetry.
Digital mammography has been progressively introduced in screening centers, since recent evolution of CR and DR detectors. However, it is questionable which exposure conditions would be more suitable when these techniques are applied, in order to reduce the glandular breast doses, as they are related with induced carcinogenesis. Several exposures have been performed in CR and DR mammography units for comparing absorbed doses during quality control assessments and during screening, diagnosis and treatment. In the first case, the CIRS11A mammographic phantom has been used with standard exposure conditions (28 kV, AEC mode with blackening +0, 50:50 glandularity and 4.5 compressed breast thickn…
Brachytherapy organ dose estimation using Monte Carlo simulations of realistic patient models
Radiation Therapy Planning Systems (RTPS) currently used in hospitals contain algorithms based on deterministic simplifications that do not properly consider electrons lateral transport in the areas where there are changes of density, and as a result, erroneous dose predictions could be produced. According to this, the present work proposes the use of Monte Carlo method in brachytherapy planning systems, which could affect positively on the radiotherapy treatment planning, since it provides results that are more accurate and takes into account the in homogeneities density variations. This paper presents a Monte Carlo (MC) simulation of a brachytherapy prostate treatment with I-125 seeds, us…
Monte Carlo evaluation of kerma in an HDR brachytherapy bunker
In recent years, the use of high dose rate (HDR) after-loader machines has greatly increased due to the shift from traditional Cs-137/Ir-192 low dose rate (LDR) to HDR brachytherapy. The method used to calculate the required concrete and, where appropriate, lead shielding in the door is based on analytical methods provided by documents published by the ICRP, the IAEA and the NCRP. The purpose of this study is to perform a more realistic kerma evaluation at the entrance maze door of an HDR bunker using the Monte Carlo code GEANT4. The Monte Carlo results were validated experimentally. The spectrum at the maze entrance door, obtained with Monte Carlo, has an average energy of about 110 keV, m…
Analysis of the Possible Persistent Genotoxic Damage in Workers Linked to the Ardystil Syndrome
[EN] Background: A combination of several factors including a change in the paint application system; a lack of proper hygiene; and inadequate safety measures caused a severe health impact in the workers of some textile painting factories. This outbreak, mainly characterized by respiratory disorders, caused the death of six people and it has been classified as Ardystil syndrome. Materials and Methods: Fifty-two workers involved in the outbreak and 48 healthy subjects not known to have exposed to the potentially mutagenic agents participated in the study. The program evaluated possible genotoxic damage through the sister chromatid exchange (SCE) cytogenetic biomarker assay. We determined the…
Sister chromatid exchange, (SCE), High-Frequency Cells (HFCs) and SCE distribution patterns in peripheral blood lymphocytes of Spanish adult smokers compared to non-smokers
According to the International Agency for Research on Cancer, smoking tobacco is a major cause of cancer in humans. It causes about half of all male cancer deaths and an ever increasing number of cancer deaths in females. The aim of this study was to establish whether cigarette smoking increases sister chromatid exchanges (SCEs) in peripheral blood lymphocytes in two Spanish population groups; light and heavy smokers. The mean number of High-Frequency Cells (HFCs) was determined and, the SCE distribution pattern among the chromosomes was analysed represented by a ratio described below. A local sample of 101 adult smokers (n = 48) and non-smokers (n = 53), aged from 18 to 49 years, was studi…
Improving pediatric radiation dose management using Agfa digital radiography DICOM header information
Dose reduction in pediatric explorations is especially important because of children radiation sensitivity. According to this, with the aim of saving radiation exposure in future clinical practice, we have developed a technique to control delivered dose in pediatric radiographic exams. To that, a computer science program has been developed to calculate entrance skin dose (ESD) provided by AGFA radiology digital system, using the "lgM" parameter exported from Dicom files. ESD values are compared with dose limits established in regulations to detect if children are being exposed to excessive amounts of radiation during their explorations.
Comparison between transmission and scattering spectrum reconstruction methods based on EPID images.
Numerous improved physics-based methods for Linac photon spectra reconstruction have been published; some of them are based on transmission data analysis and others on scattering data. In this work, the two spectrum unfolding approaches are compared in order to experimentally validate its robustness and to determine which is the optimal methodology for application on a clinical quality assurance routine. Both studied methods are based on EPID images generated when the incident photon beam impinges onto plastic blocks. The distribution of transmitted/scatter radiation produced by this object centered at the beam field size was measured. Measurements were performed using a 6 MeV photon beam p…
Diffusion equations with negentropy applied to denoise mammographic images.
Mammography is a radiographic technique used for the detection of breast lesions. The analysis of the digital image normally requires a previous application of filters as a preprocessing step to reduce the noise level of the image, while preserving important details to carry out a suitable diagnostic. In the literature, there are a large amount of denoising techniques applied to different medical images. In this work we have studied the performance of a diffusive filter with a stopping condition based on the statistical concept of negentropy, applied to denoise mammographic images. The negentropy has been succesfully prove with other denoising methods as independent component analysis by th…
Coupling of density wave oscillations in parallel channels with high order modal kinetics: application to BWR out of phase oscillations
Abstract In this paper, we study the behavior of a system formed by two parallel channels coupled to a multimodal kinetics. The first problem that arises is the calculation of the reactivity coefficients for the higher modes. This problem is solved by means of the introduction of distribution factors for a given reactor region which depend on the involved modes. We have also performed a detailed analysis of the different instability types which can be obtained from the model changing the boundary conditions and the feedback gains of the fundamental and first harmonic modes.