Speaker
Description
Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT) uses a nuclear reaction between boron atoms (10B) and neutrons to selectively destroy cancer cells from the inside. To estimate the treatment effect in real-time, the use of prompt gamma rays (478 keV) emitted by the 10B(n,α)7Li reaction has been proposed using a collimator. Although the collimator is able to detect the direction of incident gamma rays, background events increase due to scattering by the collimator itself. Therefore, we have developed a novel detector consisting of a scintillator, optical fiber and photomultiplier tube without the collimator.
On the other hand, single photon counting method is not available for the high counting rate and the detection of the direction for the gamma rays without the collimator. Here, if energy discrimination is not needed, the imaging is expected using center-of-gravity calculations from current mode measurement with multiple photosensors. Thus, we demonstrate a BNCT-simulated experiment and verified the adaptability of the new detection method.
Using the developed detector consisting of a novel scintillator crystal, optical fiber and photomultiplier tube, we measured gamma rays of 478 keV produced by the nuclear reaction between 10B and thermal neutrons. The boron position was successfully imaged from the current values obtained at several channels. We report on the details of our detector and imaging results.
| Workshop topics | Applications |
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