Tomotherapy archive structure and new software tool for loading and advanced analysis of data contained in it

Area of Science:

• Medical Physics
• Radiotherapy Technology
• Data Science in Oncology

Background:

• Tomotherapy treatment planning systems (TPS) generate complex data archives.
• Efficient analysis of TPS data is crucial for radiotherapy optimization.
• Existing methods for TPS data extraction can be cumbersome.

Purpose of the Study:

• To analyze the structure of data within tomotherapy TPS archives.
• To develop a user-friendly application for automated TPS data reading and analysis.
• To incorporate external algorithms for image registration, dose deformation, and summation.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of exported files from a tomotherapy TPS archive.
• Utilized XML Viewer and HxD hex editor for file inspection.
• Developed a data analysis application using MATLAB R2009b with a graphical user interface (GUI).

Main Results:

• Identified TPS archives contain .xml, .img, and .sin data files.
• MATLAB tools facilitate efficient data analysis and transformation.
• The developed application automates data loading and simplifies handling with a GUI.

Conclusions:

• Determined the storage methods for critical data (tomography images, structure sets, dose distributions) in TPS archives.
• Enabled the development and optimization of methods for loading and analyzing tomotherapy data.
• Facilitated more efficient utilization of radiotherapy treatment planning data.