D. Hall

The Versatile Link common project: feasibility report

The Versatile Link is a bi-directional digital optical data link operating at rates up to 4.8 Gbit/s and featuring radiation-resistant low-power and low-mass front-end components. The system is being developed in multimode or singlemode versions operating at 850 nm or 1310 nm wavelength respectively. It has serial data interfaces and is protocol-agnostic, but is targeted to operate in tandem with the GigaBit Transceiver (GBT) serializer/deserializer chip being designed at CERN. This paper gives an overview of the project status three and a half years after its launch. It describes the challenges encountered and highlights the solutions proposed at the system as well as the component level. It concludes with a positive feasibility assesment and an outlook for future project development directions.

The radiation induced attenuation of optical fibres below −20°C exposed to lifetime HL-LHC doses at a dose rate of 700 Gy(Si)/hr

The LHC luminosity upgrade, known as the HL-LHC, will require high-speed optical links to read out data from the detectors. Such links must be capable of withstanding high doses whilst being kept at low temperatures. Two single-mode and two multi-mode fibres were exposed to 200 kGy(Si) at a dose rate of about 700 Gy(Si)/hr, whilst being kept at about -25°C. The radiation induced attenuation of these fibres was measured as the fibres accumulated dose. A conservative estimate has been made of the total attenuation expected for a realistic fibre route through the ATLAS detector after a lifetime dose at the HL-LHC. With safety factors, the maximum dose extrapolated to was 375 kGy(Si). All four fibres performed extremely well and were qualified for use at HL-LHC detectors.

Validation of nuclear models in Geant4 using the dose distribution of a 177 MeV proton pencil beam

A proton pencil beam is associated with a surrounding low-dose envelope, originating from nuclear interactions. It is important for treatment planning systems to accurately model this envelope when performing dose calculations for pencil beam scanning treatments, and Monte Carlo (MC) codes are commonly used for this purpose. This work aims to validate the nuclear models employed by the Geant4 MC code, by comparing the simulated absolute dose distribution to a recent experiment of a 177 MeV proton pencil beam stopping in water. Striking agreement is observed over five orders of magnitude, with both the shape and normalisation well modelled. The normalisations of two depth dose curves are lower than experiment, though this could be explained by an experimental positioning error. The Geant4 neutron production model is also verified in the distal region. The entrance dose is poorly modelled, suggesting an unaccounted upstream source of low-energy protons. Recommendations are given for a follow-up experiment which could resolve these issues.

The radiation tolerance of MTP and LC optical fibre connectors to 500 kGy(Si) of gamma radiation

The LHC luminosity upgrade, known as the High Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC), will require high-speed optical links to read out data from the detectors. The optical fibre connectors contained within such a link must have a small form factor and be capable of operating in the harsh radiation environment at the HL-LHC. MTP ribbon fibre connectors and LC single fibre connectors were exposed to 500 kGy(Si) of gamma radiation and their radiation hardness was investigated. Neither type of connector exhibited evidence for any significant radiation damage and both connectors could be qualified for use at HL-LHC detectors.

Comparing stochastic proton interactions simulated using TOPAS-nBio to experimental data from fluorescent nuclear track detectors

Whilst Monte Carlo (MC) simulations of proton energy deposition have been well-validated at the macroscopic level, their microscopic validation remains lacking. Equally, no gold-standard yet exists for experimental metrology of individual proton tracks. In this work we compare the distributions of stochastic proton interactions simulated using the TOPAS-nBio MC platform against confocal microscope data for Al2O3:C,Mg fluorescent nuclear track detectors (FNTDs). We irradiated [Formula: see text] mm3 FNTD chips inside a water phantom, positioned at seven positions along a pristine proton Bragg peak with a range in water of 12 cm. MC simulations were implemented in two stages: (1) using TOPAS to model the beam properties within a water phantom and (2) using TOPAS-nBio with Geant4-DNA physics to score particle interactions through a water surrogate of Al2O3:C,Mg. The measured median track integrated brightness (IB) was observed to be strongly correlated to both (i) voxelized track-averaged linear energy transfer (LET) and (ii) frequency mean microdosimetric lineal energy, [Formula: see text], both simulated in pure water. Histograms of FNTD track IB were compared against TOPAS-nBio histograms of the number of terminal electrons per proton, scored in water with mass-density scaled to mimic Al2O3:C,Mg. Trends between exposure depths observed in TOPAS-nBio simulations were experimentally replicated in the study of FNTD track IB. Our results represent an important first step towards the experimental validation of MC simulations on the sub-cellular scale and suggest that FNTDs can enable experimental study of the microdosimetric properties of individual proton tracks.

Status of Higgs Physics

The analysis presented in this thesis has found significant experimental evidence for the process Open image in new window .

Sampling random directions within an elliptical cone

This work extends the spherical surface sampling algorithm in order to uniformly generate random directions within an elliptical cone. This has applications in Monte Carlo particle transport simulations, for example modeling asymmetric beam divergence or scattering interactions. Two methods are presented. The first obeys the strict boundary of the elliptical cone. The second relaxes this requirement, increasing the range of generated directions by up to 10% for elliptical cones of extreme eccentricity. However, the second method is able to generate directions beyond the equator.

TH-CD-209-09: Quickly Identifying Good Candidates for Proton Therapy From Geometric Considerations.

PURPOSE We developed a knowledge-based model that can predict the patient-specific benefits of proton therapy based upon geometric considerations. The model could also aid patient selection in model-based clinical trials or help justify clinical decisions to insurance companies. METHODS The knowledge-based method trains a model upon existing proton treatment plans, exploiting correlations between dose and distance-to-target. Each OAR is split into concentric subvolumes surrounding the target volume, and a skew-normal PDF is fit to the dose distribution found within each shell. The model learns from shared trends in how the best-fit skew-normal parameters depend upon distance-to-target. It can then predict feasible OAR DVHs for a new patient (without a proton plan) based upon their geometry. The expected benefits of proton therapy are assessed by comparing the predicted DVHs to those of an IMRT plan, using a metric such as the equivalent uniform dose (EUD). RESULTS A model was trained for clival chordoma, owing to its geometric complexity and the multitude of nearby OARs. The model was trained using 20 patients and validated with a further 20 patients, and considers several different OARs. The predicted EUD was in good agreement with that of the actual proton plan. The coefficient of determination (R-squared) was 85% overall, 92% for cochleas, 80% for optic chiasm and 79% for spinal cord. The model exhibited no signs of bias or overfitting. When compared to an IMRT plan, the model could classify whether a patient will experience a gain or a loss with an accuracy between 75% and 95%, depending upon the OAR. CONCLUSION We developed a model that can quickly and accurately predict the patient-specific benefits of proton therapy in clival chordoma patients, though models could be trained for other tumor sites. This work is funded by National Cancer Institute grant U19 CA 021239.

SU-F-T-139: Meeting the Challenges of Quality Control in the TOPAS Monte Carlo Simulation Toolkit for Proton Therapy

PURPOSE Monte Carlo particle transport simulation (MC) codes have become important tools in proton therapy and biology, both for research and practice. TOPAS is an MC toolkit serving users worldwide (213 licensed users at 95 institutions in 21 countries). It provides unprecedented ease in 4D placement of geometry components, beam sources and scoring through its user-friendly and reproducible parameter file interface. Quality control (QC) of stochastic simulation software is inherently difficult, and the versatility of TOPAS introduces additional challenges. But QC is vital as the TOPAS development team implements new features, addresses user feedback and reacts to upgrades of underlying software (i.e. Geant4). METHODS Whenever code is committed to our repository, over 50 separate module tests are automatically triggered via a continuous integration service. They check that the various module options execute successfully and that their results are statistically consistent with previous reference values. Prior to each software release, longer end-to-end tests automatically validate TOPAS against experimental data and a TOPAS benchmark. These include simulating multiple properties of spread-out Bragg peaks, validating nuclear models, and searching for differences in patient simulations. RESULTS Continuous integration has proven effective in catching regressions at the time they are introduced, particularly when implementing new features that involve refactoring code (e.g. multithreading and ntuple output). Code coverage statistics highlight untested portions of code and guide development of new tests. The various end-to-end tests demonstrate that TOPAS accurately describes the physics of proton therapy within clinical tolerances. CONCLUSION The TOPAS QC strategy of frequent short tests and pre-release long tests has led to a more reliable tool. However, the versatility of TOPAS makes it difficult to predict how users might combine different modules, and so QC ultimately remains a partnership between the developer and the user. This work was funded by National Cancer Institute grant R01 CA 140735.

Overview of the \(H\rightarrow \textit{WW}\) Analysis

The \(WW\) decay of the Higgs boson is a promising search channel as it has a large branching ratio (BR) for a wide range of \(m_H\). In fact, it is the most probable decay for \(m_H > 135\) GeV (see Fig. 1.5). This chapter will describe the experimental search for \(gg\rightarrow H \rightarrow WW \rightarrow \ell \nu \ell \nu \) (where \(\ell = { e}, \mu \)) using the 2012 dataset of \(pp\) collisions at \(\sqrt{s} = 8\) TeV. The search strategy is optimised for a low mass Higgs boson, as favoured by electroweak fits, and thus accounts for off-shell \(W\) bosons.