Physicists in the US have shown that protons themselves can be used to provide the complex 3D images essential for tailoring proton therapy to individual patients. Researchers in the US built a prototype detector to carry out “proton computed tomography” (proton CT), and found that in around 6 min it could generate maps of proton stopping power – energy lost per unit distance in a material – that were more accurate and required a much lower radiation dose than existing techniques.
Proton tomography offers better preparation for therapy
