Medical Physics Seminar – Monday, January 27, 2014
Simulation, Analysis, and Optimization of the Dielectric Wall Accelerator
Adam Uselmann (student of Dr. T. Rockwell Mackie)
Research Assistant, Dept of Medical Physics, UW-School of Medicine & Public Health, Madison, WI - USA -
Proton therapy is a powerful tool in cancer treatment, yet access to this modality has been limited due to large size of the accelerators
used and the facilities to house them, which come with an extremely high financial cost. The dielectric wall accelerator (DWA) is a type of compact particle accelerator that can potentially bring proton and heavy ion therapy into more widespread clinical use at a significantly lower cost than existing devices. However, the technology pushes the limits of current materials and electronics, making the maximization of the efficiency of the design absolutely crucial. In this talk, an investigation of the critical parameters of the device will be presented. Additionally, the preliminary design of a small-scale prototype suitable for particle induced x-ray emission (PIXE) spectroscopy will be discussed.