678 research outputs found
Beam Orientation Optimization for Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy using Adaptive l1 Minimization
Beam orientation optimization (BOO) is a key component in the process of IMRT
treatment planning. It determines to what degree one can achieve a good
treatment plan quality in the subsequent plan optimization process. In this
paper, we have developed a BOO algorithm via adaptive l_1 minimization.
Specifically, we introduce a sparsity energy function term into our model which
contains weighting factors for each beam angle adaptively adjusted during the
optimization process. Such an energy term favors small number of beam angles.
By optimizing a total energy function containing a dosimetric term and the
sparsity term, we are able to identify the unimportant beam angles and
gradually remove them without largely sacrificing the dosimetric objective. In
one typical prostate case, the convergence property of our algorithm, as well
as the how the beam angles are selected during the optimization process, is
demonstrated. Fluence map optimization (FMO) is then performed based on the
optimized beam angles. The resulted plan quality is presented and found to be
better than that obtained from unoptimized (equiangular) beam orientations. We
have further systematically validated our algorithm in the contexts of 5-9
coplanar beams for 5 prostate cases and 1 head and neck case. For each case,
the final FMO objective function value is used to compare the optimized beam
orientations and the equiangular ones. It is found that, our BOO algorithm can
lead to beam configurations which attain lower FMO objective function values
than corresponding equiangular cases, indicating the effectiveness of our BOO
algorithm.Comment: 19 pages, 2 tables, and 5 figure
GPU-based ultra-fast direct aperture optimization for online adaptive radiation therapy
Online adaptive radiation therapy (ART) has great promise to significantly
reduce normal tissue toxicity and/or improve tumor control through real-time
treatment adaptations based on the current patient anatomy. However, the major
technical obstacle for clinical realization of online ART, namely the inability
to achieve real-time efficiency in treatment re-planning, has yet to be solved.
To overcome this challenge, this paper presents our work on the implementation
of an intensity modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) direct aperture optimization
(DAO) algorithm on graphics processing unit (GPU) based on our previous work on
CPU. We formulate the DAO problem as a large-scale convex programming problem,
and use an exact method called column generation approach to deal with its
extremely large dimensionality on GPU. Five 9-field prostate and five 5-field
head-and-neck IMRT clinical cases with 5\times5 mm2 beamlet size and
2.5\times2.5\times2.5 mm3 voxel size were used to evaluate our algorithm on
GPU. It takes only 0.7~2.5 seconds for our implementation to generate optimal
treatment plans using 50 MLC apertures on an NVIDIA Tesla C1060 GPU card. Our
work has therefore solved a major problem in developing ultra-fast
(re-)planning technologies for online ART
GPU-based Iterative Cone Beam CT Reconstruction Using Tight Frame Regularization
X-ray imaging dose from serial cone-beam CT (CBCT) scans raises a clinical
concern in most image guided radiation therapy procedures. It is the goal of
this paper to develop a fast GPU-based algorithm to reconstruct high quality
CBCT images from undersampled and noisy projection data so as to lower the
imaging dose. For this purpose, we have developed an iterative tight frame (TF)
based CBCT reconstruction algorithm. A condition that a real CBCT image has a
sparse representation under a TF basis is imposed in the iteration process as
regularization to the solution. To speed up the computation, a multi-grid
method is employed. Our GPU implementation has achieved high computational
efficiency and a CBCT image of resolution 512\times512\times70 can be
reconstructed in ~5 min. We have tested our algorithm on a digital NCAT phantom
and a physical Catphan phantom. It is found that our TF-based algorithm is able
to reconstrct CBCT in the context of undersampling and low mAs levels. We have
also quantitatively analyzed the reconstructed CBCT image quality in terms of
modulation-transfer-function and contrast-to-noise ratio under various scanning
conditions. The results confirm the high CBCT image quality obtained from our
TF algorithm. Moreover, our algorithm has also been validated in a real
clinical context using a head-and-neck patient case. Comparisons of the
developed TF algorithm and the current state-of-the-art TV algorithm have also
been made in various cases studied in terms of reconstructed image quality and
computation efficiency.Comment: 24 pages, 8 figures, accepted by Phys. Med. Bio
An efficient imaging algorithm for GNSS-R bi-static SAR
Global Navigation Satellite System Reflectometry (GNSS-R) based Bi-static Synthetic Aperture Radar (BSAR) is becoming more and more important in remote sensing, given its low power, low mass, low cost, and real-time global coverage capability. Due to its complex configuration, the imaging for GNSS-R BSAR is usually based on the Back-Projection Algorithm (BPA), which is very time consuming. In this paper, an efficient and general imaging algorithm for GNSS-R BSAR is presented. A Two Step Range Cell Migration (TSRCM) correction is firstly applied. The first step roughly compensates the RCM and Doppler phase caused by the motion of the transmitter, which simplifies the SAR data into the quasi-mono-static case. The second step removes the residual RCM caused by the motion of the receiver using the modified frequency scaling algorithm. Then, a cubic phase perturbation operation is introduced to equalize the Doppler frequency modulation rate along the same range cell. Finally, azimuth phase compensation and geometric correction are completed to obtain the focused SAR image. A simulation and experiment are conducted to demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed algorithm, showing that the proposed algorithm is more efficient than the BPA, without causing significant degradation in imaging quality
GPU-based Fast Low-dose Cone Beam CT Reconstruction via Total Variation
Cone-beam CT (CBCT) has been widely used in image guided radiation therapy
(IGRT) to acquire updated volumetric anatomical information before treatment
fractions for accurate patient alignment purpose. However, the excessive x-ray
imaging dose from serial CBCT scans raises a clinical concern in most IGRT
procedures. The excessive imaging dose can be effectively reduced by reducing
the number of x-ray projections and/or lowering mAs levels in a CBCT scan. The
goal of this work is to develop a fast GPU-based algorithm to reconstruct high
quality CBCT images from undersampled and noisy projection data so as to lower
the imaging dose. The CBCT is reconstructed by minimizing an energy functional
consisting of a data fidelity term and a total variation regularization term.
We developed a GPU-friendly version of the forward-backward splitting algorithm
to solve this model. A multi-grid technique is also employed. We test our CBCT
reconstruction algorithm on a digital NCAT phantom and a head-and-neck patient
case. The performance under low mAs is also validated using a physical Catphan
phantom and a head-and-neck Rando phantom. It is found that 40 x-ray
projections are sufficient to reconstruct CBCT images with satisfactory quality
for IGRT patient alignment purpose. Phantom experiments indicated that CBCT
images can be successfully reconstructed with our algorithm under as low as 0.1
mAs/projection level. Comparing with currently widely used full-fan
head-and-neck scanning protocol of about 360 projections with 0.4
mAs/projection, it is estimated that an overall 36 times dose reduction has
been achieved with our algorithm. Moreover, the reconstruction time is about
130 sec on an NVIDIA Tesla C1060 GPU card, which is estimated ~100 times faster
than similar iterative reconstruction approaches.Comment: 20 pages, 10 figures, Paper was revised and more testing cases were
added
3D tumor localization through real-time volumetric x-ray imaging for lung cancer radiotherapy
Recently we have developed an algorithm for reconstructing volumetric images
and extracting 3D tumor motion information from a single x-ray projection. We
have demonstrated its feasibility using a digital respiratory phantom with
regular breathing patterns. In this work, we present a detailed description and
a comprehensive evaluation of the improved algorithm. The algorithm was
improved by incorporating respiratory motion prediction. The accuracy and
efficiency were then evaluated on 1) a digital respiratory phantom, 2) a
physical respiratory phantom, and 3) five lung cancer patients. These
evaluation cases include both regular and irregular breathing patterns that are
different from the training dataset. For the digital respiratory phantom with
regular and irregular breathing, the average 3D tumor localization error is
less than 1 mm. On an NVIDIA Tesla C1060 GPU card, the average computation time
for 3D tumor localization from each projection ranges between 0.19 and 0.26
seconds, for both regular and irregular breathing, which is about a 10%
improvement over previously reported results. For the physical respiratory
phantom, an average tumor localization error below 1 mm was achieved with an
average computation time of 0.13 and 0.16 seconds on the same GPU card, for
regular and irregular breathing, respectively. For the five lung cancer
patients, the average tumor localization error is below 2 mm in both the axial
and tangential directions. The average computation time on the same GPU card
ranges between 0.26 and 0.34 seconds
Tensile Deformation of Oriented Poly(ε-caprolactone) and Its Miscible Blends with Poly(vinyl methyl ether)
The structural evolution of micromolded poly(ε-caprolactone)
(PCL) and its miscible blends with noncrystallizable poly(vinyl
methyl ether) (PVME) at the nanoscale was investigated as a function of
deformation ratio and blend composition using in situ synchrotron smallangle
X-ray scattering (SAXS) and scanning SAXS techniques. It was
found that the deformation mechanism of the oriented samples shows a
general scheme for the process of tensile deformation: crystal block slips
within the lamellae occur at small deformations followed by a stressinduced
fragmentation and recrystallization process along the drawing
direction at a critical strain where the average thickness of the crystalline
lamellae remains essentially constant during stretching. The value of the
critical strain depends on the amount of the amorphous component
incorporated in the blends, which could be traced back to the lower
modulus of the entangled amorphous phase and, therefore, the reduced network stress acting on the crystallites upon addition of
PVME. When stretching beyond the critical strain the slippage of the fibrils (stacks of newly formed lamellae) past each other
takes place resulting in a relaxation of stretched interlamellar amorphous chains. Because of deformation-induced introduction of
the amorphous PVME into the interfibrillar regions in the highly oriented blends, the interactions between fibrils becomes
stronger upon further deformation and thus impeding sliding of the fibrils to some extent leading finally to less contraction of the
interlamellar amorphous layers compared to the pure PCLNational Natural Science Foundation of China (21204088 and 21134006). This
work is within the framework of the RCUK/EPSRC Science Bridges China project of UK−China Advanced Materials Research Institute (AMRI)
An epitaxial model for heterogeneous nucleation on potent substrates
© The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society and ASM International 2012In this article, we present an epitaxial model for heterogeneous nucleation on potent substrates. It is proposed that heterogeneous nucleation of the solid phase (S) on a potent substrate (N) occurs by epitaxial growth of a pseudomorphic solid (PS) layer on the substrate surface under a critical undercooling (ΔT ). The PS layer with a coherent PS/N interface mimics the atomic arrangement of the substrate, giving rise to a linear increase of misfit strain energy with layer thickness. At a critical thickness (h ), elastic strain energy reaches a critical level, at which point, misfit dislocations are created to release the elastic strain energy in the PS layer. This converts the strained PS layer to a strainless solid (S), and changes the initial coherent PS/N interface into a semicoherent S/N interface. Beyond this critical thickness, further growth will be strainless, and solidification enters the growth stage. It is shown analytically that the lattice misfit (f) between the solid and the substrate has a strong influence on both h and ΔT ; h decreases; and ΔT increases with increasing lattice misfit. This epitaxial nucleation model will be used to explain qualitatively the generally accepted experimental findings on grain refinement in the literature and to analyze the general approaches to effective grain refinement.EPSRC Centre for Innovative Manufacturing in Liquid Metal Engineerin
Orbital effects of a monochromatic plane gravitational wave with ultra-low frequency incident on a gravitationally bound two-body system
We analytically compute the long-term orbital variations of a test particle
orbiting a central body acted upon by an incident monochromatic plane
gravitational wave. We assume that the characteristic size of the perturbed
two-body system is much smaller than the wavelength of the wave. Moreover, we
also suppose that the wave's frequency is much smaller than the particle's
orbital one. We make neither a priori assumptions about the direction of the
wavevector nor on the orbital geometry of the planet. We find that, while the
semi-major axis is left unaffected, the eccentricity, the inclination, the
longitude of the ascending node, the longitude of pericenter and the mean
anomaly undergo non-vanishing long-term changes. They are not secular trends
because of the slow modulation introduced by the tidal matrix coefficients and
by the orbital elements themselves. They could be useful to indepenedently
constrain the ultra-low frequency waves which may have been indirectly detected
in the BICEP2 experiment. Our calculation holds, in general, for any
gravitationally bound two-body system whose characteristic frequency is much
larger than the frequency of the external wave. It is also valid for a generic
perturbation of tidal type with constant coefficients over timescales of the
order of the orbital period of the perturbed particle.Comment: LaTex2e, 24 pages, no figures, no tables. Changes suggested by the
referees include
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