Ion beam radiotherapy
During the heavy ion therapy project GSI, we contributed to the development of patient positioning, treatment planning and dosimetry, which were then employed for patient treatments from 1997 - 2008. During this time many physical, biological (Experimental radiobiology of ion beams) and clinical investigations have been performed. The developments in medical physics have been transferred to the Heidelberg Ion Beam Radiotherapy Center (HIT), which started clinical operation in 2009. The experience gained at GSI is also incorporated into scientific and educational courses on ion beam radiotherapy and as well as into radiation protection trainings.
Figure 1: a) Stack of ionization chambers for dose verification in ion beam radiotherapy. b) Dose distribution with indicated measurement positions. c) Rotatable solid-state phantom carrying 24 ionization chambers for dose verification in ion beam radiotherapy
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Selected publications
- Hartmann G.H., Jäkel O., Heeg P., Karger C.P., Krießbach A.: Determination of water absorbed dose in a carbon ion beam using thimble ionization chambers. Physics in Medicine and Biology 44, 1193-1206, 1999 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0031-9155/44/5/008
- Karger C.P., Jäkel O., Hartmann G.H., Heeg P.: A system for three-dimensional dosimetric verification of treatment plans in intensity-modulated radiotherapy with heavy ions. Medical Physics 26, 2125-2132, 1999 https://aapm.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1118/1.598728
- Karger C.P., Hartmann G.H., Jäkel O., Heeg P.: Quality management of medical physics issues at the German heavy ion therapy project. Medical Physics 27, 725-736, 2000 https://aapm.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1118/1.598935
- Jäkel O., Hartmann G.H., Karger C.P., Heeg P., Rassow J.: Quality assurance for a treatment planning system in scanned ion beam therapy. Medical Physics 27, 1588-1600, 2000 https://aapm.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1118/1.599025
- Jäkel O., Krämer M., Karger C.P., Debus J.: Treatment planning for heavy ion radiotherapy: clinical implementation and application. Physics in Medicine and Biology 46, 1101-1116, 2001 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0031-9155/46/4/314
- Jäkel O., Jacob C., Schardt D., Karger C.P., Hartmann G.H.: Relation between carbon ion ranges and X-ray CT numbers for tissue equivalent phantom materials. Medical Physics 28, 701-703, 2001 https://aapm.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1118/1.1357455
- Karger C.P., Schulz-Ertner D., Didinger B.H., Debus J., Jäkel O.: Influence of setup errors on spinal cord dose and treatment plan quality for cervical spine tumors: A phantom study for photon IMRT and heavy charged particle radiotherapy. Physics in Medicine and Biology 48, 3171-3189, 2003 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0031-9155/48/19/006
- Henkner K., Winter M., Echner G., Ackermann B., Brons S., Horn J., Jäkel O., Karger C.P.: A motorized solid-state phantom for patient-specific dose verification in ion beam radiotherapy. Physics in Medicine and Biology 60, 7151-7163, 2015 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0031-9155/60/18/7151
Reviews
- Karger C.P., Jäkel O.: Current status and new developments in ion therapy. Strahlentherapie und Onkologie 183, 295-300, 2007 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs00066-007-1645-x
- Jäkel O., Karger C.P., Debus J.: The Future of Heavy Ion Radiotherapy. Medical Physics 35, 5653-5663, 2008 https://aapm.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1118/1.3002307
- Karger C.P., Jäkel O., Palmans H., Kanai T.: Dosimetry for Ion Beam Radiotherapy. Physics in Medicine and Biology 55, R193–R234, 2010 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0031-9155/55/21/R01