GATE MODELING OF LATERAL SCATTERING OF PROTON PENCIL BEAMS

Abstract To validate the GATE Monte Carlo simulation code and to investigate the lateral scattering of proton pencil beams in the major body tissue elements in the therapeutic energy range. In this study, GATE Monte Carlo simulation code was used to compute absorbed dose and fluence of protons in a water cubic phantom for the clinical energy range. To apply the suitable physics model for simulation, different physics lists were investigated. The present research also investigated the optimal value of the water ionization potential as a simulation parameter. Thereafter, the lateral beam profile of proton pencil beams were simulated at different energies and depths in body tissue elements. The range results obtained using the QGSP_BIC_EMY physics showed the best compatibility with the NIST database data. Moreover, it was found that the 76 eV is the optimal value for the water ionization potential. In the next step, it was shown that the beam halo can be described by adding a supplementary Gaussian function to the standard single-Gaussian model, which currently is used by treatment planning systems (TPS).