A database of photon mass-energy transfer coefficients for dosimetric materials from 1 keV to 100 MeV

Abstract

In this technical report, we provided a comprehensive database for mass energy-transfer coefficients and kerma rate constant in a wide range of energy photons from 1 keV to 100 MeV for human tissues and tissue equivalents. According to the authors' knowledge, the mass energy-transfer coefficients have been less investigated than total mass attenuation coefficients and mass-energy absorption coefficients; while, the mass-energy transfer coefficients are necessary to calculate the kerma and dose. Therefore, the present work focuses on calculating mass-energy transfer coefficients and kerma rate constant for photons in a wide range of energies using the Monte Carlo code (MCNP6.1) for 25 materials, which are widely used in radiation dosimetry. In this study, the obtained data have a good agreement with the previous literature. The application of the provided database is in the field of radiation dosimetry, radiation shielding and radiation therapy.

Comparison of photon interaction coefficients for tumor compositions and healthy tissues simulated by Monte Carlo

“…Although there are studies evaluated various photon interactions for body tissues of dosimetric significance [38][39][40], data for malign tumor compositions [41,42] are scarce and mostly about neutrons [43,44]. However, in tumors and healthy tissues, photons interact differently because the proportion of certain elements in these tissues vary appreciably.…”