Assessing the water-equivalence of Staphylococcus aureus-hydrogel systems for biological radiation dosimetry

In the search of tissue-equivalent materials in terms of ionizing radiations to provide solutions to the high demanding modern ionizing radiation applications, this work studies the behavior of the stopping power and the mass attenuation coefficient of two hydrogel-based dosimeters inoculated with Staphylococcus-aureus strains, known as MAA and MAAG, which have proven capability for biological dosimetry. The study is carried out for different energies of electron, proton, and photon beams within their corresponding therapeutic application range. The implemented approaches include theoretical formalisms along with simulation techniques based on the PENELOPE and the FLUKA Monte Carlo codes. Finally, the systems are analyzed using different experimental methodologies. The obtained results exhibit promising behaviors as water-equivalent systems in terms of the achieved consistency when comparing with liquid water reported data.