This study aimed to compare different types of right breast cancer radiotherapy planning techniques and to estimate the whole-body effective doses and the critical organ absorbed doses. The three planning techniques are intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT), volumetric modulated arc therapy (VMAT; two methods) and hybrid 3D-CRT/IMRT (three-dimensional conformal radiotherapy/intensity-modulated radiotherapy). The VMAT technique includes two methods to deliver a dose: non-continuous partial arc and continuous partial arc. A thermoluminescent dosimeter (TLD) is placed in the RANDO phantom to estimate the organ absorbed dose. Each planning technique applies 50.4 Gy prescription dose and treats critical organs, including the lung and heart. Dose-volume histogram was used to show the planning target volume (V95%), homogeneity index (HI), conformity index (CI), and other optimized indices. The estimation of whole-body effective dose was based on the International Commission on Radiation Protection (ICRP) Publication 60 and 103. The results were as follows: Continuous partial arc and non-continuous partial arc showed the best CI and HI. The heart absorbed doses in the continuous partial arc and hybrid 3D-CRT/IMRT were 0.07 ± 0.01% and 0% (V5% and V10%, respectively). The mean dose of the heart was lowest in hybrid 3D-CRT/IMRT (1.47 Gy ± 0.02). The dose in the left contralateral lung (V5%) was lowest in continuous partial arc (0%). The right ipsilateral lung average dose and V20% are lowest in continuous partial arc. Hybrid 3D-CRT/IMRT has the lowest mean dose to contralateral breast (organs at risk). The whole-body effective doses for ICRP-60 and ICRP-103 were highest in continuous partial arc (2.01 Sv ± 0.23 and 2.89 Sv ± 0.15, respectively). In conclusion, the use of VMAT with continuous arc has a lower risk of radiation pneumonia, while hybrid 3D-CRT/IMRT attain lower secondary malignancy risk and cardiovascular complications.

Digital radiography (DR) is a mature technology and has been broadly used in medical diagnosis. Currently, it’s also used for fruit quality inspection in the market. This purpose of the study is to conduct non-destructive experiments for visual comparisons of digital radiography images, further construct visualized grayscale image analysis technology, and analyze the changes in lemon quality and ripening using quantitative statistical methods. The materials used for the experiments were three lemons of different ripening. A general medical X-ray DR system for was used in this study for 2D digital radiography. The medical X-ray DR images were created based on the Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM) standard. Photometric interpretation of monochrome was applied to create multi-layered grayscale images. Then quantitative analyses and comparisons were performed with image matrix structures and grayscale pixel values in the tissues using visualization techniques and statistical methods. After layer segmentation on the radiological images, the correlations between the lemon structures and tissue changes were assessed by using the Kruskal–Wallis test. The results showed that the p values for lemon, fiber, and pulp were all under 0.05, while the peel layer did not exhibit significant change. The pulp layer is the best region for statistical analyses to determine the lemon ripening. In conclusion, this study can provide a solid reference for future quality classification in the agricultural market. The research findings can be referenced for developing computing techniques applied to agricultural inspection, expanding the scope of application of the medical DR technology.

Digital radiography is currently the main method of medical imaging diagnosis. It also has a wide range of applications across different fields. This study used radiation to conduct non-destructive visual imaging, and further established a quantitative analysis for visual gray-scale images to determine changes in the quality of eggs. Eggs of the same weight with three quality classes were chosen according to the egg labels available on the market. Furthermore, a general medical X-ray digital imaging system was used to apply two-dimensional digital radiography. A photometric interpretation of monochrome gray-scale imaging established by the Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM) standard was used to conduct a quantitative stratification analysis of the matrix data visualization, along with one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) for quantitative statistics of the gray-scale values for the three structures, i.e., shell, air cell, and yolk. The statistical results showed that X-ray digital gray-scale images and a quantitative stratification analysis of the matrix data visualization results are less easily identified based on visual differences. In the quantitative statistical results of the one-way ANOVA gray-scale values, the whole-egg and in-egg quantitative matrix analysis both show p < 0.05. In the analysis of egg freshness, the quantitative statistics of the percentage of space occupied by the air cell in the eggs also showed p < 0.05. In addition, the results of the freshness of each egg were graded. The quality and freshness of the eggs can be quantitatively analyzed through radiographic imaging. The results of this study will provide a more scientific and quantitative reference for the quality and freshness of agricultural products in the future.

Retrospective dosimetry is one of the most important tools of accident dosimetry for environmental dose estimation when large-scale radiological incidents and nuclear mass-casualty events occur. Electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) dosimetry is a physical method for the retrospective assessment of absorbed dose based on the measurement of stable radiation-induced radicals in materials. Different from the fast disappearance of radials in aqueous systems, the radials can persist indefinitely in some organized matrices. Therefore, environmental materials contained in creatures from sea or land can be potentially used as environmental dosimeters for a retrospective dose analysis. This study aims to assess the EPR signals of free radicals from environmental biological samples, potentially for the retrospective dose estimation. The evaluated samples involve ox bone, cyclina shell, clam shell, chitin from squid, and human tissue (enamel and fingernail). First, we dehydrate and grind these materials to the powder with different sizes. Subsequently, all materials were irradiated with different doses ranging from 5 Gy to 50 Gy using 6 MV linear accelerator, and EPR spectra of these materials were obtained from the calculation of peak-to-peak amplitudes. The dose-response curve of EPR signals versus irradiated dose for the six materials shows good linearity (R²~0.99). For the grain-size experiment, the ox bone and tooth with 0.5 mm, the chitin with 0.1 mm, and the others with 1 mm have the strongest signal. For the storage temperature experiment, the optimal temperature of storage is at −20 °C for tooth, fingernail, ox bone, and chitin, at 45 °C for clam shell and cyclina shell where the signal fading is minimal. In conclusion, the developed dose-response curves of the six materials may potentially help a fast, rough retrospective dose reconstruction under the environment when radiation accidents occur.

Adjuvant radiotherapy is an important treatment modality after breast-conserving surgery. Due to its proximity, radiation therapy for the left breast can often lead to an escalated heart dose that can result in heart diseases. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the heart dose reduction by using lead shields surrounding the left breast. The doses of a 3D conformal radiotherapy (3D-CRT) plan, an intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) plan, and volumetric-modulated arc therapy (VMAT) to the left breast tumor in a CIRS ATOM anthropomorphic female adult phantom were measured by optically stimulated luminescence dosimeters (OSLDs). To protect critical organs, the skin around the target area was covered by lead shields of two different thicknesses (0.125 mm and 0.25 mm). The results showed that compared to IMRT and 3D-CRT, VMAT provided better planning target volume (PTV) coverage, a better conformity index (CI), and homogeneity index (HI). With the use of lead shields, the thyroid dose was reduced by 5.12–27.5% and 20.51–30%, respectively; the heart dose was reduced by 49.41–50.12% and 56.38–57.42%, respectively; and the lung dose was reduced by 1.23–45.22% and 0.98–57.83%, respectively. Although the clinical application of lead shields was rare, this study verified that it could effectively decrease the heart dose from 4.31 ± 0.09 Gy to 1.88–2.18 Gy, thereby potentially reducing the risk of associated heart diseases by 14.8%. Further works to implement this method into clinical practice are needed.

With advancements in aesthetic medicine, breast augmentation has become a popular plastic surgery worldwide, typically performed using either fine-needle injection or silicone implants. Both carry complication risks from rupture over time. In this study, we aimed to reduce misjudgments and increase diagnostic value by developing an MRI technique that can produce water- and silicone-specific images from MRI scans of phantoms (Natrelle^® saline-filled breast implants) and human bodies. Pig oil, soybean oil, and normal saline were used to simulate human breast tissue, and two common types of breast implants, saline bags, and silicone bags, were selected as well, resulting in five materials scanned. Six pulse sequences were applied: T1W fast spin echo (FSE), T1W SPGR/60, T2W, T2W fat-saturation, STIR, and STIR water-saturation. Human body scans were additionally investigated using 3D SPGR fat-saturation dynamic contrast enhancement. Results show that the best way to enhance tissue contrast in images of silicone implants is to apply STIR combined with water suppression, and the best way to enhance saline bag implants is to apply T2W fat-saturation combined with fat suppression. Both offered very high sensitivity and specificity, rendering this method especially useful for distinguishing normal mammary glands from siliconoma.