October 3, 2017

UOW plays host to international radiation physics workshop

Researchers focus on improving a software pivotal for the fight against cancer. 

From 19-29 September, more than 80 national and international researchers from 18 different countries visited Wollongong to participate in the 2017 Geant4 User Workshop and Collaboration Meeting, to discuss the development and the applications of the Geant4 Toolkit in radiation physics.
 
Geant4 is a platform for the simulation of the passage of particles through matter and is the most used Monte Carlo-based software adopted as a research tool in radiation physics, including medical physics research performed at the UOW Centre For Medical Radiation Physics.

The platform is used in a wide range of applications spanning from the characterisation of the radiation field typical of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in its chase of the Higgs Boson, to the verification of clinical radiotherapy treatment planning systems and development of quality assurance technology for radiotherapy.

Geant4 is developed and maintained by a large international collaboration, the Geant4 Collaboration, which sees the contribution of more than 100 scientists working in different institutes worldwide, including international physics research centres such as CERN (Switzerland), SLAC (US), Fermilab (US), KEK (Japan) and IN2P3 (France), among others.

Event organiser Dr Susanna Guatelli from UOW’s Centre for Medical Radiation Physics, a Geant4 collaborator since 2002, said hosting the event was a great opportunity for the School of Physics and the Centre For Medical Radiation Physics.

“The Geant4 Collaboration meets once per year to discuss the developments of the software and this is the first time the annual event has been held in the Southern Hemisphere,” she said.

“It was fantastic to see national and international researchers under one roof at the University of Wollongong to discuss the development of this software, which has extensive impact in the improvement of radiotherapy, in the fight against cancer.

“The Geant4 User Workshop was a great opportunity for Geant4 collaborators and users to discuss the applications of the toolkit in medical physics.”
 
The event was sponsored by the UOW School of Physics and the Centre for Medical Radiation Physics.