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Neutron production from a 10 MV medical line

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1977 Phys. Med. Biol. 22 90

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PHYS. MED. BIOL., 1977, VOL. 22, NO. 1, 90-94. @ 1977

Technical Note

Neutron Production from a 10 MV Medical Linac

J. A. DEYE, PH.D.
Radiation Physics Division, George Washington University Medical Center,
901 23rd Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20037, U.S.A.
F. c. YOUNG, PH.D.
Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC 20375, U.S.A.

Received 19 July 1976

1. Introduction
Fast neutron contamination of high-energy bremsstrahlung beams in radio-
therapy has been investigated in previous publications (Laughlin 1951, Ernst
and Ovadia 1956, Pohlit 1960, Frost and Michel 1964, Brenner 1965, Loefgren
and Spring 1970, Axton and Bardell 1972, Kehrerand Robinson 1972,
Wilenzick, Almond, Oliver and de Almeida 1973, McGinley, Wood, Mills and
Rodriguez 1976). However,linearaccelerators were considered in only the
last few of these references and all but the last reference concentrate solely on
the ‘in field’ and ‘whole-body’ doses to the patient undergoing treatment. The
present work considers neutron measurements for the Varian Clinac-18 linear
accelerator and reports on data obtained outside the treatment room. The
need for these lattermeasurements is emphasized in a recent Bureau of Radio-
logical Health study (BRH1976)which states thefollowing: ‘It seems probable
that the neutron dose danger to the cancer patient will be relatively minor in
relation t o the life threatening aspects of his disease. However, the problem
of adequate shielding of machine operators and otherpersonnel against neutrons
scattered into the maze and through the treatment room door may require
more attention.’

2. General method
2.1. Set-up and irradiation conditions
Neutron measurements were performed a t four different locations around
the Varian Clinac-18 accelerator at the George Washington University Medical
Center. The acceleratorwas operated in the10 MV photon mode which produces
neutrons by (y,n) reactions in the copper target and tungsten flattening filter
and in the othermaterials in the bremsstrahlung beam. Fig. 1 shows the room
layout and the four measurement locations. Data were taken at all locations
1.3 m above the floor with a 25 cm cube polystyrene phantom in the beam a t
 Neutron Production from a 10 MV Medical Linac 91

y r _""""" l

1 il;:+ 6mm Pb door

l-

Fig. 1. Room layout and four measurement locations @.Locations 3 and 4 are each
100 cm from a 25 cm3 phantom which is at 100 cm TSD. The beam is directed
vertically downward for measurements 1, 2 and 3 and it is directed horizontally
toward the maze for measurements at 4.

100 cm target-surface-distance (TSD). A 25 cm square field a t isocentre was

used for all measurementsand it was directed vertically downwardfor measure-
ments a t locations 1, 2 and 3. Location 3 is 100cm from the edge of the
phantom. Data at the fourth location were taken with the beam horizontal
toward the maze wall. I n this case the detector was placed on the central axis,
100 cm behind the phantom. The dose rate at isocentre was 600 radmin-l for
the data at the remote locations (1,2) and it was 200 rad min-l for the near
locations (3,4).

2.2. Detection
Two different neutron detectorswere used to cover the large rangeof neutron
fluxes expected at the different locations. These detectors were developed by
one of the authors (F. C. Y.), and a more detailed discussion of them may be
found elsewhere (Young 1975).
Small fluxes (at locations 1 and 2) were measured with a 12.7 cm diameter
6Li-glass scintillator detector. The prompt photon response of this detector
was discriminated against by gating the counting system off for 10 p with a
delayedguntrigger pulse from the accelerator.Theneutron pulses, which
are slower due to their flight time and time for moderation in the detector,
were then counted by gating thesystem on for approximately 2.5 ms between
gun pulses. Background counts were taken and never found to exceed 0.2%
of the reading. This detector had a sensitivity of 16 CPS per unit neutron flux
density and a background of approximately 2 CPS. Therefore neutron fluxes
92 J . A . Deye and F . C . Young

as small as 0.2 n cm-2 s-l could be measured. This detector cannot be used near
the linac because it is paralysed for an extended duration by an intense burst
of photons.
For larger neutron fluxes (locations 3 and 4)a 5.1 cm diameter Rh-activation
counter was used. The technique used with this system was to irradiate the
rhodium foil with beam on for 3 min and then count the induced activity with
beam off for one mean lifetime (60 S). A delay of at least 15 min was used
between successive irradiations and allreadings were corrected for residual
activity. The sensitivity of this detector was 15 cPM/ncm-2s-1 immediately
following an activation period of 3 min. The background in this detector was
300 CPM, therefore neutronfluxes greater than 20 n cm-2 S-1 could be measured.
After the measurements were completed, both detectors were calibrated in
terms of n cm-2 counts” with standard neutron sources at theNaval Research
Laboratory.The 6Li-glass detector was calibratedwith an Am-Li neutron
source while the Rh-activationcounter was calibratedwitha 252Cf source.
The Am-Li energy spectrum has a mean of a few hundred keV and cuts off
above 1 MeV (Hansen 1960); whereas the 252Cfsource produces a characteristic
fission spectrum with a mean energy of about 1.5 MeV (Grundl 1971). These
sources were chosen for the calibrations in part because their energy spectra
arenot too dissimilar fromthoseexpected atthe scatteredand leakage
positions respectively (NBS 1964).

3. Results
3.1. The present data
Theresultsobtained at the variouslocations are given intable 1. The
neutron intensity is stated both in terms of the neutron flux density and in
terms of the neutron fluence per photon rad at isocentre.

Table 1. Summary of neutron flux and fluence per rad?

measured at different locations
Flux density Dose rate Fluence per rad
Detector Location$ (n cm-2 S-l) (rad min-l)? (n cm-2 rad-’)?
12.7 cm 6Li 1 6.3 66 600
12.7 cm 6Li 2 43 440 600
5.1 cm Rh 3 1.4x 104 200 4.1 X 103
5.1 cm Rh 4 7.8 X 103 200 2.3 x 103

t Photon rad a t isocentre (100 cm TSD)

See fig. 1 and text for details.

The decrease in neutron flux from location 3 to location 4 suggests that the
neutrons originate primarily from the treatment unit head and not from the
phantom.Thisobservation is consistentwith thefactthatthere was no
change in the measured neutron flux a t position 3 when the phantom was
removed. The treatment unit head is the expected source of neutrons from
(y, n ) reactions on high Z target materials.
 Neutron Production from a 10 MV Medical Linac 93

If the neutron intensity scales linearly with dose rate, the neutron fluence
per rad shows a decrease of two orders of magnitude from location 3 to location
2. Neutrons reach the detector a t location 2 by multiple scattering from the
walls of the room andthe maze. It has been pointed out that neutrons
reflectances approaching 10% can be expected from concrete shielding walls
surrounding medical linacs (BRH 1976). With such large reflectances and
with negligible transmission through the 3 ft concrete maze wall, a decrease in
neutron fluence of two orders of magnitude from location 3 to location 2 is
not unreasonable.
I n addition, locations 2 and 1 show a seven-fold reduction in neutron fluence
per rad going through the5.1 cm wood door (with 6 mmPb insert). Attenuation
by the door and scattering from it back into the maze can probably account
for this reduction.
A crosscheck of the absolute calibration of our two detectors was made by
repeating the neutron flux measurement a t position 2 with the Rh-activation
counter. The result was a neutron fluence per rad of92 or a factor of two
greater than the sLi-glass detector results. We can probably attribute most of
this discrepancy to the fact that the detectors were calibrated with highly
localized neutron sources, but the measurements were madewitha highly
scattered source with neutrons incident on the detector from essentially all
directions (particularly a t location 2).

3.2. Comparison with previous results

The present results a t location 3 can be compared with the previous linac
data of Axton and Bardell (1972)) Wilenzick et al. (1973) and McGinley et al.
(1976). The present results are roughly 20 times smaller than the out-of-beam
measurements of Axton and Bardell and 30 times smallerthan similar measure-
ments by Wilenzick et al. These differences are probably due to the higher
energyelectronbeams used inthosemeasurements, i.e. 16 and 25MeV
respectively. The comparison with Axton and Bardell may not be meaningful
because they do not state their treatment distance or the location of their
detectoroutside theX-ray field.Also the silicon diodemeasurements of
Wilenzick have not been corrected forthe various photonuclear reactionswhich
can take place in the silicon (Almond 1975). McGinley et al. (1976) report a
total neutron fluence per photon rad of 1-64x lo4 a t 5 cm outside a 10 x 10 cm
photon beam from a Varian Clinac-18. This result is four times greater than
the present measurement at location 3 which was 1 m from the beam edge.
I n view of this difference in distances these results compare favourably.
Neutron dose rate measurements outside the treatment door of a Clinac-18
(comparable to location 1 in the present measurements) have been reported
by McGinley et al. (1976). They report values ranging from 1 to 3 mrem h-1
for different neutron detectorswhen the Clinac-18is operated with100 radmin-1
at the treatmentposition. This is in good agreement with our measurement a t
location 1 which corresponds to 1-2 mrem h-1 undersimilaroperating
conditions.
94 Neutron
Production from a 10 MV Medical Linac

4. Conclusions
4.1, Patient dose
Conversion from neutron fluence to dose can be accomplished by means of
the 2szCffactor of 3.0 5 0.1 x radn-1 cm-2 recommended by Stone, Wagner,
Jones and Shinpaugh (1970). This 252Cf factor is appropriate for these photo-
neutronmeasurements because theirspectraare similar (NBS 1964). Using
this factor along with our data one may conclude that the average whole-body
neutron dose (in rads) to the radiotherapy patient is of the order of O - O O l ~ o
of the isocentre photon dose. If one further assumes a quality factor of 10 for
fast neutrons this would become (in rem) O.Olyoof the photon dose,
4.2. Environmental dose
The time-averaged flux for a 2000 hour work year to deliver 5 rem with
1 MeV neutronsisstatedas 18ncm-2s-1 (NBS 1960). Thisconverts to a
yearly flux of 1-3x lo8 n cm-2yr-1. If we take our measured fluence at location
1 of 6 - 3 n cm-2rad-1 times 25 patients per day times 200 rad per patient times
5 days per week times 50 weeks per year, we get a result of 8 x 106 n cm-2yr-1
or 6% of the occupational MPD.
From these results it does not appear that neutrons represent a significant
problem eitherfor thepatient or the personnel a t this facility.However,
since (y,n) cross-sections are significantly effected by the beam energy and
targetmaterial,theseresults should be extrapolatedwith care to other
installations including other Clinac-18 facilities which will have different room
designs. Thus individual surveys should be performed.

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