• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.247-254
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• 2004

According to developing high energy linear accelerators and treatment methods, like (3 dimensional conformal radiotherapy (3D-CRT), intensity modulated radiotherapy (IMRT), many radiotherapy centers are replacing older linear accelerators with new higher technical machines. This often presents a shielding problem as the designed shield for the existing rooms is not adequate for the higher technical machines. Additional shielding in limited existing space becomes necessary. We are replacing older brachytherapy room with new higher technical linear accelerator for IMRT. This room is not adequate for the IMRT machine without additional shielding design. The logical development of optimum structural shielding designs with concrete and high density shielding blocks are presented. We obtained following results by comparison between the pre-calculating values and actual survey of completed LINAC installation. High density shielding blocks have more powerful radiation protection about 2 times.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.6
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• pp.2335-2347
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• 2023

As medical facilities are usually built at urban areas, special concrete aggregates and evaluation methods are needed to optimize the design of concrete walls by balancing density, thickness, material composition, cost, and other factors. Carbon treatment rooms require a high radiation shielding requirement, as the neutron yield from carbon therapy is much higher than the neutron yield of protons. In this case study, the maximum carbon energy is 430 MeV/u and the maximum current is 0.27 nA from a hybrid particle therapy system. Hospital or facility construction should consider this requirement to design a special heavy concrete. In this work, magnetite is adopted as the major aggregate. Density is determined mainly by the major aggregate content of magnetite, and a heavy concrete test block was constructed for structural tests. The compressive strength is 35.7 MPa. The density ranges from 3.65 g/cm³ to 4.14 g/cm³, and the iron mass content ranges from 53.78% to 60.38% from the 12 cored sample measurements. It was found that there is a linear relationship between density and iron content, and mixing impurities should be the major reason leading to the nonuniform element and density distribution. The effect of this nonuniformity on radiation shielding properties for a carbon treatment room is investigated by three groups of Monte Carlo simulations. Higher density dominates to reduce shielding thickness. However, a higher content of high-Z elements will weaken the shielding strength, especially at a lower dose rate threshold and vice versa. The weakened side effect of a high iron content on the shielding property is obvious at 2.5 µSv=h. Therefore, we should not blindly pursue high Z content in engineering. If the thickness is constrained to 2 m, then the density can be reduced to 3.3 g/cm³, which will save cost by reducing the magnetite composition with 50.44% iron content. If a higher density of 3.9 g/cm³ with 57.65% iron content is selected for construction, then the thickness of the wall can be reduced to 174.2 cm, which will save space for equipment installation.