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The Young Americans
One of the highlights of Sunday afternoon’s programme will be the Young Investigators Symposium. Ten finalists - chosen from hundreds of hopeful graduate students, post doctoral fellows and medical physics residents - will each present a short talk about their research, and a panel of experts will then select the best three.
Variety is the order of the day for this year’s symposium, with topics ranging from a technique for doing exit dosimetry on Tomotherapy systems to a theoretical analysis of the Swank Factors of segmented crystalline scintillating detectors. Look out in particular for an update on the development of the University of Wisconsin’s (Madision, WI) brachytherapy robot, which medicalphysicsweb reported on last October (see Robotic brachytherapy: assuming control).
According to its developers, this device has the potential to revolutionize prostate brachytherapy, making it faster, more accurate and accessible to many more people. During the symposium graduate student Michael Meltsner will report how the addition of a magnetic tracking system has yielded improvements in both the robot’s accuracy and its versatility.
There is also an interesting example of technology cross-over. In the seventh presentation, Youssef Charara will explain how researchers at the University of Tennessee (Knoxville, TN) have taken an instrument designed for characterizing the lunar radiation environment and used it as the basis for a proton-therapy calibration system.
The full line-up looks like this:
- Exit dosimetry treatment verification using auto-associative kernel regression R Seibert et al.
- Dose convolution filter: Incorporating spatial dose information into tissue response modeling Y Huang et al.
- The development and validation of an image-based dosimetry system for 90Y microspheres used to treat hepatic tumors R Selwyn et al.
- Localizing through optimization of image acquisition rate and tube current in X-ray fluoroscopy-guided therapy S Siddique and D Jaffray.
- Segmented crystalline scintillating detectors for radiotherapy imaging: A Monte Carlo investigation of Swank Factor Y Wang et al.
- Stray radiation exposure during proton radiotherapy of the prostate: The influence of the patient on scatter and production JD Fontenot et al.
- Development of a novel detector for measuring proton energy spectra Y Charara et al.
- Real-time three-dimensional position and orientation data of a brachytherapy robot using magnetic tracking M Meltsner et al.
- On the impact of functional imaging accuracy (sensitivity and specificity) on selective boosting IMRT Y Kim and W Tome.
- Quantitative assessment of the accuracy of proton beam range verification with PET/CT A Knopf et al.
