Towards an hybrid deterministic-stochastic module in GATE simulations - 2 years postdoc

The CREATIS laboratory and the Léon Bérard cancer centre (CLB, Lyon, France) open a 24 months postdoc position in the field of simulations in radiation therapy. The position is funded by the ANR tGate project.

Context

The tGate project involves 4 research teams in France (Lyon, Brest, Toulouse, Orsay) and aims at extending the Monte-Carlo Gate platform (www.opengatecollaboration.org) to theranostic scenarios, mixing imaging and therapy. Within this project, we focus on developing a general module for hybrid simulations combining Monte-Carlo and analytical models. The main objective is the improvement of computational efficiency. To our knowledge no equivalent hybrid module exists in other known MC simulation platforms and represents a key element to the future of the proposed platform.

Examples of hybrid algorithms are:

  • TLE (Track Length Estimator) method for low energy photon dose deposition. This method already exists in some codes (MCNPX) and was recently included in GATE (Mittone et al. 2013).
  • seTLE (exponential TLE): this approach improves the previous approach by about one order of magnitude (Smekens et al. 2014).
  • pgTLE : Exponential estimator for prompt-gamma emission (rare events), for which no solution currently exists.
  • fd : forced-detection approaches for X-ray imaging simulations (Freud et al. 2005). These approaches have to be developed, adapted and validated within GATE.

Goal

The task of the recruited person will be to:

  1. Investigate methods to remove computation artefact observed with seTLE fast dose computation methods. 
  2. Propose a generic approach to analytically manage detectors response in Gate. 
  3. Participate to forced-detection project

Profile

  • The candidate must hold a master in medical physics, physics or image processing.
  • Scientific interests: computer sciences (medical image processing), x-ray and particle physics, Monte Carlo simulations.
  • Programming skills: high level in C++ required.
  • Language: English required.
  • Location: Centre Léon Bérard, Lyon, France.
  • Salary (net): about 1900 euros/month.
  • Period: 2 years starting in 2015.

Contacts. Send CV by email to:

References. 

  • (Mittone et al. 2013) A. Mittone, F. Baldacci, A. Bravin, E. Brun, F. Delaire, C. Ferrero, S. Gasilov, N. Freud, J. M. Létang, D. Sarrut, et al., "An efficient numerical tool for dose deposition prediction applied to synchrotron medical imaging and radiation therapy.", Journal of synchrotron radiation, vol. 20, issue Pt 5, pp. 785-92, 2013
  • (Smekens et al. 2014) ] F. Smekens, J. M. Létang, C. Noblet, S. Chiavassa, G. Delpon, N. Freud, S. Rit, and D. Sarrut, "Split exponential track length estimator for Monte-Carlo simulations of small-animal radiation therapy", Physics in medicine and biology, vol. 59, issue 24, pp. 7703-7715, 2014
  • (Poludniowski et al. 2009) An efficient Monte Carlo-based algorithm for scatter correction in keV cone-beam CT. G Poludniowski et al 2009 Phys. Med. Biol. 54 3847
  • (Freud et al 2005) N. Freud, J.M. Létang and D. Babot, “A hybrid approach to simulate multiple photon scattering in X-ray imaging”, NIMB, vol. 227, pp. 551-558, 2005