Comparison and calibration of dose delivered by¹³⁷Cs and x-ray irradiators in mice

Objective.The Office of Radiological Security, U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration, is implementing a radiological risk reduction program which seeks to minimize or eliminate the use of high activity radiological sources, including¹³⁷Cs, by replacing them with non-radioisotopic technologies, such as x-ray irradiators. The main goal of this paper is to evaluate the equivalence of the dose delivered by gamma- and x-ray irradiators in mice using experimental measurements and Monte Carlo simulations. We also propose a novel biophantom as anin situdose calibration method.Approach.We irradiated mouse carcasses and 3D-printed mouse biophantoms in a¹³⁷Cs irradiator (Mark I-68) and an x-ray irradiator (X-Rad320) at three voltages (160 kVp, 225 kVp and 320 kVp) and measured the delivered radiation dose. A Geant4-based Monte Carlo model was developed and validated to provide a comprehensive picture of gamma- and x-ray irradiation in mice.Main Results.Our Monte Carlo model predicts a uniform dose delivered in soft-tissue for all the explored irradiation programs and in agreement with the absolute dose measurements. Our Monte Carlo model shows an energy-dependent difference between dose in bone and in soft tissue that decreases as photon energy increases. Dose rate depends on irradiator and photon energy. We observed a deviation of the measured dose from the target value of up to -9% for the Mark I-68, and up to 35% for the X-Rad320. The dose measured in the 3D-printed phantoms are equivalent to that in the carcasses within 6% uncertainty.Significance.Our results suggest that 320 kVp irradiation is a good candidate to substitute¹³⁷Cs irradiation barring a few caveats. There is a significant difference between measured and targeted doses for x-ray irradiation that suggests a strong need forin situcalibration, which can be achieved with 3D-printed mouse biophantoms. A dose correction is necessary for bone doses, which can be provided by a Monte Carlo calculation. Finally, the biological implications of the differences in dose rates and dose per photon for the different irradiation methods should be carefully assessed for each small-animal irradiation experiment.