摘要

Purpose: The aim of this work is to characterize a new linear accelerator collimator which contains a single pair of sculpted diaphragms mounted orthogonally to a 160 leaf multileaf collimator (MLC). The diaphragms have "thick" regions providing full attenuation and " thin" regions where attenuation is provided by both the leaves and the diaphragm. The leaves are mounted on a dynamic leaf guide allowing rapid leaf motion and leaf travel over 350 mm. Methods: Dosimetric characterization, including assessment of leaf transmission, leaf tip transmission, penumbral width, was performed in a plotting tank. Head scatter factor was measured using a mini-phantom and the effect of leaf guide position on output was assessed using a water phantom. The tongue and groove effect was assessed using multiple exposures on radiochromic film. Leaf reproducibility was assessed from portal images of multiple abutting fields. Results: The maximum transmission through the multileaf collimator is 0.44% at 6MV and 0.52% at 10 MV. This reduced to 0.22% and 0.27%, respectively, when the beam passes through the dynamic leaf guide in addition to the MLC. The maximum transmission through the thick part of the diaphragm is 0.32% and 0.36% at 6 and 10MV. The combination of leaf and diaphragm transmission ranges from 0.08% to 0.010% at 6 MV and 0.10% to 0.14% depending on whether the shielding is through the thick or thin part of the diaphragm. The off-axis intertip transmission for a zero leaf gap is 2.2% at 6 and 10 MV. The leaf tip penumbra for a 100 x 100 mm field ranges from 5.4 to 4.3 mm at 6 and 10 MV across the full range of leaf motion when measured in the AB direction, which reduces to 4.0-3.4 mm at 6 MV and 4.5-3.8 mm at 10 MV when measured in the GT direction. For a 50 x 50mm field, the diaphragm penumbra ranges from 4.3 to 3.7 mm at 6 MV and 4.5 to 4.1 mm at 10 MV in the AB direction and 3.7 to 3.2 mm at 6 MV and 4.2 to 3.7 mm when measured in the GT direction. The tongue and groove effect observed from exposure of a radiochromic film to two abutting fields is an underdose of 25%. The head scatter factor at both 6 and 10 MV is similar to that from the MLCi2 collimator to within 0.8%. The uncertainty in the leaf position reproducibility is 0.05 mm (2 sigma). Conclusions: The Agility collimator is a low leakage, high definition collimator where both the MLC and the sculpted diaphragm have been optimized for dynamic treatments.