Proton Calorimetry/Experimental Runs/2025/UCLH 2025-05
Experiment Equipment
Item | Notes |
---|---|
Portable Enclosure | Modified Small Peli Case Wheeled. Features mount for scintillator stacks, front and back openings for beam, patch panel with ports. Mylar windows with 3D printed alignment plates: approximately light-tight. |
Rev. E Scintillator stack 1 (with Rev. E boards no. 1 (L) and 4 (R)) | 32 X x 105 mm, Y x 105 mm and Z x (approx) 3 mm sheets (mix of opaque and machined sheets). |
Rev. E Scintillator stack 2 (with Rev. E boards no. 3 (L) and 9 (R)) | 32 X x 105 mm, Y x 105 mm and Z x (approx) 3 mm sheets (just machined sheets with the closest to ideal thicknesses ~3mm). |
Rev. E Scintillator stack 3 (with Rev. E boards no. 5 (L) and 6 (R)) | 32 X x 105 mm, Y x 105 mm and Z x (approx) 3 mm sheets (mix of opaque and machined sheets). |
Rev. E Scintillator stack 4 (spare stack not installed) | 32 X x 105 mm, Y x 105 mm and Z x (approx) 3 mm sheets (mix of opaque, machined, and injection moulded sheets - stacked in pairs in alternating directions). |
Rev. E Scintillator stack 5 (with Rev. E boards no. 7 (L) and 10 (R)) | 32 X x 105 mm, Y x 105 mm and Z x (approx) 3 mm sheets mix of opaque, machined, and injection moulded sheets - stacked in pairs in alternating directions). |
Rev. E Texas Instruments DDC232 custom circuit board (x9 - 8 installed in modules 1,2,3,5 and one spare) | Housing 32x Hamamatsu S12915-16R photodiodes, coupled directly to scintillator sheets. Aligned by eye to scintillator sheets. |
USB104 FPGA development board x 2 (1 main and 1 spare) | For interfacing between DDC232 and pi. |
Raspberry pi5 x 2 (1 main and 1 spare) | Control data acquisition + visualise GUI. |
Power Strip: | To connect FPGA and daughter board. |
DAQ laptop x1 | Back up option for data acquisition. |
Control Laptop x2 | 1 for remote control (Sonia's MacBook Pro), 1 for notes/web GUI (Joe's MacBook Pro). |
GL-Inet Router x2 | Primary router set in control room to take output from experimental room ethernet connection. Control laptops connected via ethernet or 5GHz WiFi. Secondary router connected to pi5 in treatment room (set as an access point). |
Ethernet Cable x4 (?) | To connect pi5 and DAQ laptop to network in the experimental room, hub to wall and in control room router to wall, and router to laptop. |
MacBook Adapters x2 | |
Spare Cables: | Usb-C flexible cables, USB-C corded cables (and right-angles angled connector), USB-C to USB-A adapter, USB-C to USB-B adaptor, USB-A to USB-B cable, right-angles network cables. power cables |
Gloves | For handling scintillator |
Schematic
Experiment Plan
Saturday 24th May
1) Shoot-through of each scintillator stack at 245 MeV to check prior calibration. 50mm absorber (?) -> scint stack -> water dump/IBA Zebra for simultaneous WET measurement (if available). Both directions for stack so will rotate midway through.
2) Background measurement of scintillator stacks 1 - 5 (exc. 4 which is spare module)
-- UCL: Add calibration files to appropiate file for GUI
3) Rotate gantry to front of case. Full system check at 245 MeV with beam on axis.
4) Single spot position pristine Bragg peaks across entire energy range in at least 10 MeV intervals, if not smaller intervals.
5) Pristine Bragg measurements taken with one side of boards (i.e. with just four boards whilst requesting 8) to check noise.
6) Single spot SOBP position across the entire range of energies that can be obtained from the nozzle. Beam on axis.
7) Single spot SOBP position from 165 MeV to 120 MeV. Beam on axis.
8) For one or a few energies, push the current up until we "flat" Bragg peak from saturation at 12.5 pC FSR, then increase to 50 pC FSR to see if issue persists.
9) Lateral displacement of pristine Bragg peaks by moving couch horizontally & vertically whilst keeping beam on axis.
10) 5 x 5 x 5cm box field, on axis from 12cm to 17cm deep.
11) Single layer with 5 x 5 grid of spots, 1cm spacing, with single spot dwell time of 500ms–1s
30,000 measurements ~ 5 secs for pristine Bragg peaks/shoot throughs.
1-2 mins per SOBP.
Experiment Notes
Original data will be saved in pi5: /home/pi/GUI/v3.01b/
A copy ot the hexadecimal files will be saved to: /unix/pbt/data/
For each run ... files will be generated:
- Run0xy.txt: raw hexadecimal data
- RunOxy_calibrated.txt: calibrated data with background subtraction. An average measurement is at the bottom with a run performed to it. Visualisation with acquisition on DAQ.html
- Run0xy_fitted_25Hz.txt: data averaged at 25Hz and fitted, with range and energy values extracted. This can be visualised in the REPLAY.html tab of the GUI.
- 50mm solid water absorber installed in front of QuARC for shoot-through calibration measurements
- WET measurements taken with IBA Giraffe with each QuARC module and no QuARC and just no absorber (note WET measurements done in Gantry 3 but QuARC data taking in Gantry 4)
Run number | Stack No. | Beam Energy (MeV) | Current (nA) | Measurements | DDC232 FSR (pC) | DDC232 Integration Time (us) | Estimated Range (mm) | Comments | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Saturday 24/05/2025 | |||||||||||
Machine QA Mode | |||||||||||
1 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | background | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | some missing bars seen at edge of first left board | ||||||
2 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | repeat background to check calibration | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | seeing some negative values from a group of photodiodes on the first board | ||||||
3 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | background lid open | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | disconnected and reconnected cable on board 4b | ||||||
4 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | background lid closed | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | ||||||
5 | stacks 1 | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
6 | stacks 1 | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
7 | stacks 1 | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
8 | stacks 1 | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
9 | stacks 1 | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
10 | stacks 1 | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
11 | stack 1 background front (2 boards) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
12 | stack 1 shoot through front (2 boards) | 245 MeV (with 50 mm absorber) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | approx 10,000 MU is sufficient for 30,000 measurements (10,000 takes approx 10s) | ||||||
13 | stack 1 shoot through back (2 boards) | 245 MeV (with 50 mm absorber) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | ||||||
14 | stack 2 background (2 boards) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
15 | stack 2 shoot through front (2 boards) | 245 MeV (with 50mm absorber) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | ||||||
16 | stack 2 shoot through back (2 boards) | 245 MeV (with 50mm absorber) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | ||||||
17 | stack 3 background (2 boards) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
18 | stack 3 shoot through front (2 boards) | 245 MeV (with 50mm absorber) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | ||||||
19 | stack 3 shoot through back (2 boards) | 245 MeV (with 50mm absorber) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | ||||||
20 | stack 4 background (2 boards) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
21 | stack 4 shoot through front (2 boards) | 245 MeV (with 50mm absorber) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | ||||||
22 | stack 4 shoot through back (2 boards) | 245 MeV (with 50mm absorber) | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | ||||||
23 | stacks 1-4 background | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - | |||||||
24 (overwritten) | stacks 1-4 | 245 MeV | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | lost connection to pi - pi lost power so changing power cable from path panel | ||||||
24 new | stacks 1-4 new background after changing pi power cable | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | ||||||||
25 | stacks 1-4 | 245 MeV | 10 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | stopped measurement at 83% because of 50 Gy (6,500 MU) now going up to 20,000 MU | |||||
26 | stacks 1-4 | 245 MeV | 10 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | look like we're close to 12.5 pC limit near Bragg peak (can't go any lower than 10 na ion source current) | |||||
27 | stacks 1-4 | 245 MeV | 10 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | not seeing scaling issue i.e. GUI seems to be displaying same charge values | |||||
28 | stacks 1-4 | 240 MeV | 10 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | so far all GUI visualisation has been done with no calibration applied | |||||
29 | stacks 1-4 | 235 MeV | 13 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | calibrated visualisation (but having to use fake calibration data for stack 4) left side Bragg peak looks fine - calibration looks strange on right | |||||
30 | stacks 1-4 | 230 MeV | 13 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | raw data displayed (RF trip when requesting beam before run) - issues with acquisition being interrupted on first attempt - so redoing still with run30 | |||||
31 | stacks 1-4 | 225 MeV | 16 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | ||||||
32 | stacks 1-4 | 220 MeV | 30 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | saturation on BP max position photodiode (i.e. clipping 12.5 pC) | |||||
33 | stacks 1-4 | 220 MeV | 30 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | display staying at same charge level except saturated photodiode going up to around 16 pC | |||||
34 | stacks 1-4 | 220 MeV | 20 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | dropping current to see if avoiding saturation at 12.5 pC FSR - just below 12.5 pC but maybe some saturated values | |||||
35 | stacks 1-4 | 215 MeV | 20 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | ||||||
36 | stacks 1-4 | 210 MeV | 40 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - acquisition cut off at about 70 % | |||||
37 | stacks 1-4 | 210 MeV | 40 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - acquisition cut off at about 97 % | |||||
38 | stacks 1-4 | 200 MeV | 95 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - a lot of saturation in module 2 | |||||
39 | stacks 1-4 | 200 MeV | 60 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - module 2 just below saturation level on 12.5 pC FSR | |||||
40 | stacks 1-4 | 190 MeV | 80 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | - saturation at end of module 2 | |||||
41 | stacks 1-4 | 190 MeV | 80 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | end of module 2 sheets are peaking around 18 pC | |||||
42 | stacks 1-4 | 180 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
43 | stacks 1-4 | background | 30,000 | 50 pC | |||||||
44 | stacks 1-4 | 170 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
45 | stacks 1-4 | 160 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | note max PD charge around 19 pC around Bragg peak | |||||
XX | stacks 1-4 | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | GUI appeared to have froze on first attempt - have lost connection to the pi - no data | |||||
XX | stacks 1-4 | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
46 | stacks 1-4 | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | reconnected pi and router after lost connection - GUI was at 12.5pC FSR so observed saturation | |||||
47 | stacks 1-4 | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
48 | stacks 1-4 | 140 MeV | 165 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
49 | stacks 1-4 | 130 MeV | 200 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
50 | stacks 1-4 | 120 MeV | 270 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
51 | stacks 1-4 | 110 MeV | 300 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | board 1 (stack 1 right) showed no signal towards end of run | |||||
52 | stacks 1-4 | 105 MeV | 300 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | board 1 (stack 1 right) showed no signal intermittently towards end of run | |||||
53 | stacks 1-4 | 100 MeV | 350 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
54 | stacks 1-4 | 95 MeV | 350 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
55 | stacks 1-4 | 90 MeV | 400 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
56 | stacks 1-4 | 85 MeV | 400 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
57 | stacks 1-4 | 80 MeV | 500 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | beam stopped at around 30 % RF Trip redoing in run058 | |||||
58 | stacks 1-4 | 80 MeV | 500 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
59 | stacks 1-4 | 75 MeV | 500 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
60 | stacks 1-4 | 70 MeV | 700 nA (clinical) | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
61 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 245 MeV | 10 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
62 | stacks 1-4 (4 boards, requesting 8 boards) | 245 MeV | 10 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
63 | stacks 1-4 (4 boards, requesting 4 boards) | 245 MeV | 10 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | ||||||
64 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | couch position 1.95 (+1 cm to right) (default pos. 0.95) - acquisition stopped at 29% (currently 50 Gy so delivered much faster than expected) | |||||
XX | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 50 pC | couch position 1.95 (+1 cm to right) (default pos. 0.95) - delivering 4x as much dose - now saturating at 50 pC FSR | |||||
65 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 100 pC | couch position 1.95 (+1 cm to right) (default pos. 0.95) - at 100 pC | |||||
66 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 100 pC | couch position 2.95 (+2 cm to right) (default pos. 0.95) | |||||
67 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 100 pC | couch position -1.05 (-2 cm to left) (default pos. 0.95) | |||||
68 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 100 pC | couch position -0.05 (-1 cm to left) (default pos. 0.95) | |||||
69 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 150 MeV | 90 nA | 30,000 | 100 pC | couch position 0.95 (0 cm default pos) (200 Gy) | |||||
70 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | SOBP | 100,000 | 100 pC | |||||||
71 | stacks 1-4 (8 boards) | 5x5 | 200,000 | 100 pC | |||||||
72 | stack 4 background | 0 | 30,000 | 12.5 pC | |||||||
73 | stack 4 shoot through back | 0 | 30,000 | 12.5 pC |