OC-0279 FlashDC project: development of a beam monitor for flash therapy

Over the past decades, research in Radiotherapy (RT) has been focused on the goal of reducing damages from additional dose to healthy tissues whilst retaining high tumor control probability. Recent preclinical studies suggest that a new approach could be adopted by exploiting beams with ultrahigh dose-rates (up to 107 Gy/s instantaneous dose-rate in a single pulse) to deliver the whole planned dose in a very short time (<200 ms), thus triggering what has been called FLASH effect, consisting of a tumor control probability comparable to standard RT and reduced toxicity to healthy tissues. However, the biological in vivo validation of FLASH effect is hindered by many open issues. One of the most urgent ones is the lack of a beam control system able to perform real time monitoring of beam intensity and direction since standard detectors (such as gas-filled ionization chambers) undergo saturation and discharges in FLASH regime. The Flash Detector beam Counter (FlashDC) project aims to develop an innovative and economical detection system capable of overcoming these limitations.