System design and method for verifying 3D dosimetric imaging of charged particles in media

1. A method of verification of the accuracy of delivery of a charged particle beam to a tumor in a human body, the method comprising:

irradiating the tumor with the charged particle beam;

receiving an ultrasound signal generated due to the irradiation of the tumor by the charged particle beam;

mapping a three dimensional source of the ultrasound signal; wherein the ultrasound signal is formed at the source in the human body due to thermo-acoustic mechanism of a stress wave generation from energy loss of charged particles associated with the charged particle beam; and

determining a value of falloff of the ultrasound signal corresponding to a distal edge of the charged particle beam associated with a Bragg peak.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

imaging the source based, at least in part, on the ultrasound signal;

digitally describing the source based, at least in part, on voxel-wise domestic data; and

reconstructing spatial energy and dose deposited and range in a direction based, at least in part, on a digital description.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

real-time comparing of dose distribution reconstructed from the ultrasound signal generated by the charged particle beam associated with treatment planning.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

real-time mapping of a reconstructed area of a dose delivery at a patient specific computerized tomography image used for acquiring with a cone-beam computerized tomography before a treatment fraction.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising developing a radioacoustic image of the charged particle beam comprises using ionizing radiation-induced acoustic computed tomography.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising developing a radioacoustic image of the charged particle beam by:

applying the charged particle beam to the tumor;

deriving a pressure wave from the tumor;

filtering the pressure wave, wherein the filtering is performed by a filter and the filter is a three dimensional filter back-projection algorithm; and

reconstructing the radioacoustic image from the filtered pressure wave.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein applying the charged particle beam to the tumor comprises applying the charged particle beam to a water phantom.

8. The method of claim 6 , wherein developing the radioacoustic image of the charged particle beam comprises developing the radioacoustic image of the charged particle beam using ionizing radiation-induced acoustic computed tomography.

9. The method of claim 8 , further comprising comparing the developed radioacoustic image to the Bragg peak and assessing linearity based upon the comparison.

10. The method of claim 6 , wherein developing the radioacoustic image of the charged particle beam is based, at least in part, on a Monte Carlo simulation.

11. The method of claim 5 , wherein performing ionizing radiation-induced acoustic computed tomography using the charged particle beam comprises using a therapeutic pencil proton beam.

12. A method of performing proton treatment therapy, the method comprising:

developing a radioacoustic image of a proton beam incident on an in vivo target;

locating a distal edge of the proton beam from the radioacoustic image; and

performing the proton treatment therapy based upon the located distal edge of the proton beam.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein developing the radioacoustic image of the proton beam comprises using a Monte Carlo simulation to develop the radioacoustic image.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein developing the radioacoustic image of the proton beam comprises using ionizing radiation-induced acoustic computed tomography.

15. The method of claim 12 , wherein the in vivo target is a tumor.

16. The method of claim 12 , further comprising:

applying the proton beam to a sample;

calculating a pressure wave based, at least in part, on the samples; and

reconstructing the image from the calculated pressure wave.

17. The method of claim 16 , wherein applying the proton beam to the sample comprises applying the proton beam to a water phantom.

18. The method of 12 , further comprising comparing the developed radioacoustic image to a Bragg peak and assessing linearity based upon the comparison.

19. The method of claim 2 , wherein the voxel-wise dosimetric data is obtained from a Monte Carlo simulation.

20. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

detecting the ultrasound signal generated by the charged particle beam in the human body with Radio-Acoustic Computed Tomography.