Radiation Dosimetry with Fricke Gels and GafChromic Films Mid-year Report

Edward Percy Supervisor: Dr. Greg Salomons November 25, 2011

Introduction
The application of radiation therapy in the treatment of tissue-related disease necessitated the development the eld of dosimetry; concerned with quantifying the amount of energy absorbed by human tissue exposed to ionizing radiation. Early dosimetry systems included silver halide lms, barium platinocyanide pastille discs, and even the change in redness of exposed human skin. Limitations associated with the accuracy and measurement range of these methods called for the development of more reliable dosimeters. Beginning in the early 2000s, a new class of colour changing, self-developing radiochromic lms became available for dose measurement[1]. Radiochromic GafChromic lms are still widely used for the purposes of 2D measurements, although there are problems associated with their handling and reading. Concurrently with the advent of radiochromic lms, certain gel systems were shown to display qualities useful for the purposes of dosimetry. Notably, the volume associated with a gel system allows for the possibility of 3D measurements. There are, however, still many challenges associated with reading a three dimensional gel. The Fricke-xylenol gel, studied here, contains components that interact to produce a colour change upon irradiation[2]. Frickes eective atomic number and good tissue equivalence predict it to be a suitable system for modeling human tissue[3]. In the current experiment, it is cured in thin layers to simulate a 2D system, allowing for comparison with GafChromic lm measurements.

Theory
The linear accelerators (linacs) used for radiation therapy exploit accelerated electrons to produce x-rays of desired energies. Within the linac, microwave energy generated from a klystron or magnetron is used to accelerate electrons, produced by a hot lament, down a waveguide. Magnetrons are typically used to power accelerators of energy 12MeV or less, whereas klystrons power higher energy linacs. The accelerated electrons are directed toward a metal target where they interact with the target nuclei to produce x-rays through the process of Bremsstrahlung radiation. The x-ray beam is ltered and then collimated to irradiate a desired shape[4]. The radiative dose delivered is measured in units of Grays (Gy), dened as the absorption of 1 Joule of energy by 1 Kilogram of material. In radiation therapy clinics, tumors are imaged and treatment programs are designed to ensure that the entire volume of diseased tissue is irradiated. The ionizing radiation delivered to the diseased tissue damages its DNA, leading to cell death. The colour change seen in a Fricke-xylenol solution is associated with the radiolysis of water. The two main components of the Fricke-xylenol solution are Ferrous ammonium sulfate and xylenol-orange, a common indicator. These two components, along with an acidic solution, are suspended in a gelatinous matrix to facilitate spatial resolution. The interaction of the ionizing radiation with water initiates the formation of radicals which strip F e2+ of an electron, leaving F e3+ ions in solution. These ferric ions interact readily with the dissolved orange indicator to from a xylenol-orange ferric complexes which appear violet. In this way, there exists a proportionality between the amount of radiation absorbed and the associated colour change. By irradiating a sample with a known amount of energy per mass and quantifying the colour change, we can determine a relationship between the change in optical density and the amount of absorbed radiation[2].

Image data of dosimeters can be stored in a variety of ways depending on the specied le format. Tagged Image File Format (TIFF) stores images digitally by assigning a pixel value to each pixel, specifying its colour with respect to a standardized colour map. Gray scale images are stored as matrices, with one gray value assigned to each pixel. True colour images, however, are stored in 3x3 arrays of values, with each pixel being assigned a value relating to its position on each of the Red, Green and Blue (RGB) scales. GafChromic lm has been shown to be most responsive to changes in the red channel[1], whereas the Fricke gel preparation has been shown to display similar sensitivity in both the red and green channels[5]. Both dosimetry systems are known to be less responsive and have a lower signal to noise ratio in the blue channel. Pre and post-irradiation images of lms and gels can be taken in order to determine the colour change due to the reactions taking place. Quantitatively, this change in optical density is measured in absorption units (AU). There is a linear relationship between these units and the absorbed dose for many systems[2]. Equation 1 shows the relationship between the change in optical density and the pixel values of pre and post-irradiation images[6]: OD = log (P VBG ) (P VP R ) (1)

where OD is the change in optical density, P VBG is a pixel value in the pre-irradiation (or background) image and P VP R is a pixel value in the post-irradiation image.

Experiment Procedure
Fricke-xylenol gel samples were prepared according to the procedure developed by previous PHYS 455 student Joel Mullins, in which porcine gelatin, acid, and ferrous ammonium sulfate xylenol-orange solutions are mixed and cured in 3mm layers using petri dish frames[5]. Following background image collection, gels were irradiated using linear accerators at Kingston General Hospital using predetermined radiation plans. 8in10in sheets of GafChromic lm were cut in half and irradiated over a similar range of doses to facilitate a comparison of the two dosimetry systems. During radiation, 2cm of plastic water were placed above the sample and 10cm were place below to allow for appropriate forward and backward scatter. Gels were given around 30 minutes each to develop before post-radiation images were taken[5]. Background and post-radiation images of lms and gels were taken using both a commercial Epson Expression 10000XL scanner and a prototype CCD camera system designed Modus Medical Devices. True colour, 48-bit images were collected at 150dpi by the scanner and stored in TIFF format. The prototype system consists of a CCD camera suspended above a red LED light box where samples were placed. Images from the prototype were taken using 16-bit gray scale at 72dpi and also stored in TIFF format. In each case, three images were taken and averaged in the analysis in order to reduce the error due to scanner warm-up and other image to image discrepancies.

Analysis techniques and Results

Initial trials were run in order to test the gel making and measurement protocol. Data from these trials was used to test the hypothesis that the blue channel is less responsive and has a 3

larger relative error than the red and green channels. All collected data was analyzed using built-in and custom designed functions in MatLab. Figure 1 shows the histograms of red, green and blue pixel values from an image of a gel irradiated with 300cGy. The standard deviations about the mean pixel values are 0.7352, 0.9547 and 2.4841 respectively. The standard deviation in the blue pixel values is about twice as much as that from either the red and green channels in all background and post-radiation images. It can be concluded that the blue channel has a greater uncertainty than the red or green channels.

(a) Red Channel

(b) Green Channel

(c) Blue Channel

Figure 1: Histograms of Red, Green, and Blue channel pixel values in a post-radiation image of Fricke-xylenol gel irradiated with 300cGy. The change in optical density as a function of radiation dose can be determined in a number of dierent ways, depending on how pixel values in an image are separated and averaged. In the most recent set of experiments three gels were irradiated, each with a grid of nine 3x3 squares of dose ranging from 50-430cGy. For comparison, six sheets of GafChromic lm were irradiated with 10x10 squares of dose ranging from 50-350cGy. Films and gels were analyzed using both the Epson scanner and the CCD prototype. Matlab routines were designed to read and crop images, selecting only the region exposed to a given radiative dose. Images from the Epson scanner were separated into red, green and blue colour channels for further analysis. The three corresponding images of each cropped section were averaged and the mean pixel value of this average image was calculated. The standard deviation about the mean pixel value was taken as the uncertainty. Background and post-radiation mean values were then used in Equation 1 to yield relationships between absorbed dose and OD. Uncertainty on the dose values is estimated to be 5% based on gel inconsistencies and a 2cm air gap between the plastic water and the surface of the sample, inherent to the design of the gel frame[5]. Figure 2a) shows the gel sample to follow a linear trend in the red and green colour channels when measured using the Epson scanner. The red and green plots t their lines to norm of residuals values of 0.00668 and 0.01200, indicating a very good t. We conclude that, unlike GafChromic lms, Fricke-xylenol gels are most responsive to changes in optical density in the green channel. It is clear from Figure 2b) that the blue channel displays a high signal to noise ratio and is less responsive than the red or green channels. Images of Fricke-xylenol gels collected from the CCD prototype, presented in Figure 2c), show a large uncertainty and do not adhere to a linear trend. Figure 3 shows GafChromic lms display much lower uncertainty than the Fricke-xylenol gel samples. As discussed earlier, the red channel in GafChromic lm is more responsive to 4

(a) Epson Scanner Red and Green Channel

(b) Epson Scanner Blue Channel

(c) CCD prototype Gray Channel

Figure 2: Relationship between dose and OD for a Fricke-xylenol sample imaged on the Epson scanner and the Modus Medical CCD prototype. radiation than the green or blue channels. Images collected on the Epson scanner t linear trends to norm of residuals values of 0.01756, 0.00917 and 0.00244 in the red, green and blue channels respectively. Data from the blue channel, the least responsive of the three, seems to best obey the linear t, although it must stressed that it also has the greatest amount of uncertainty. Figure 3b) shows the change in optical density of the same GafChromic lms, analyzed using the CCD system. Unlike the Fricke-xylenol gels, the lms obey a linear relationship when imaged on this system. They t the linear trend to a norm of residuals of 0.04868, indicating a fairly good t.

(a) Epson Scanner

(b) Modus Medical CCD Prototype

Figure 3: Relationship between dose and OD for GafChromic lm samples imaged on the Epson scanner and CCD prototype.

Discussion and Outlook

The 2D Fricke-gel samples have been shown to follow an approximately linear relationship between irradiated dose and change in optical density when imaged using red and green channels of the Epson scanner. To this point however, GafChromic lm, analyzed on the scanner, appears to be the most reliable dosimetry system of all those tested. As sources of error associated with the gel are reduced and new methods of analysis using the CCD prototype and novel MatLab routines are investigated, the aim is to increase the accuracy of the gels until they become as reliable as GafChromic lms. One of the main sources of error associated with the gel frame is the 2cm air gap between the surface of the gel sample and the ridge where the plastic water phantom sits. Methods of reducing this distance have been tested. It was found that coating the top dish with plastic wrap and pealing it o before irradiation introduced wavy patters in about 50% of the samples. Currently, a new method of gently pipetting the gel into a single dish without introducing bubbles is being developed. If successful, this will greatly reduce the uncertainty associated with the dose delivered to the gel. With future data, new methods of averaging images during the analysis will been investigated. For example, the General sliding-neighborhood function built into MatLab allows for the value of a pixel to be assigned as the mean of the pixel values in an nxn matrix surrounding it. This method will be applied to gel images before pixel-by-pixel background subtraction is performed. It is hoped that this method of averaging will reduce variation due to imperfections in system, such as scratches in the dish or small bubbles in the gel. The CCD camera provided by Modus Medical Devices is limited to taking 16-bit gray scale images with 72dpi. The limitation of working with gray scale as opposed to true colour may be balanced by certain problems associated with the scanner that can be avoided using the CCD setup. In future trials, image capture settings will be investigated and optimized. For example, the relationship between frame rate and exposure time will be adjusted in order to reduce the signal to noise ratio. A dense optical material will also be purchased in order to better block any ambient light from eecting the measurements.

References
[1] C. G. Soares et. al,Radiochromic Film, AAPM Mono- graph, Summer School Clinical Dosimetry Measurements in Radiotherapy (D. Rogers and J. Cygler, eds.), ch. 23, pp. 759 814, Medical Physics Publishing, Madison WI, 2009. [2] L. J. Schreiner and T. Olding, Gel dosimetry, AAPM Monograph, Summer School Clinical Dosimetry Measurements in Radiotherapy (D. Rogers and J. Cygler, eds.), ch. 30, pp. 979 1025, Medical Physics Publishing, Madison WI, 2009. [3] R. Sato, A. De Almeida, and M. V. Moreira, 137Cs source dose distribution using the Fricke Xylenol Gel dosimetry, Nucl. Inst. and Meth., vol. B 267, pp. 842-845, 2009. [4] C.J. Karzmark and R.J. Morton, A Primer on Theory and Operation of Linear Accelerators in Radiation Therapy, Medical Physics Publishing (1989). [5] J. Mullins Development of a Fricke-xylenol gel as a lm layer PHYS 455 thesis project, Queens University, 2010. [6] G. Gambarini, M. Carrara, V. Colli, and S. Tomatis, Further developments and applications of layer gel dosimetry, J. Phys.:Conf. Ser., vol. 3, pp. 213-216, 2004.