The OMA scientific workpackages beam imaging &diagnostics, treatmentoptimization and facility design& optimisation build bridgesbetween research communitiesthat should readily communicatewith one another. Our network isactively helping establish newcontacts and reinforce existingones through a series of TopicalWorkshops. Our most recent onetook us to CERN whereparticipants discussed thechallenges in beam and patientimaging. The 2-day event wasideal to review the state-of-the-art and identify the manyoverlaps in research challenges.The workshop saw excellentdiscussions and first collaborativeR&D projects have alreadyresulted from the event. Allpresentations are available onlineand can be accessed via theevent indico page.

Our next workshop will nowfocus on the question how atreatment beam can best beimaged and how the requireddiagnostics can be bestintegrated into the machine. Thedialogue between the instrumentdevelopers and acceleratordesigners will be important tofurther enhance the performanceof existing and future treatmentfacilities. This topical workshopwill be held at GSI in Germany on11-12 December 2018.Registration will open shortly viaour website.

Finally, I would like to say a big“thank you!” to COSYLAB forproviding a special Academy toour Fellows between 6-8 June2018. Whilst most of our Fellowsare unlikely to become controlsystems specialists in the future,the detailed insight andopportunity for discussion withCOSYLAB experts, provided avery welcome addition to theoverall OMA training programme.

Identifying solutions for most pressing research challenges

Prof. Carsten P. Welsch OMA Coordinator

Highlights

• Radiobiological

effectiveness of

protons

• Progress with

Medipix3

• 2nd Topical

Workshop

held at CERN

• Fellows Activity

• Partner News

ExpressJuly 2018

Issue 7

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Radiobiological effectiveness of protonsOMA Fellow Anna Baratto Roldán, willpresent in August 2018 her first report onthe status of her project “Radiobiologicaleffectiveness of protons”. This project aimsto set up a new system for the irradiation ofbiological samples at the IBA cyclotroninstalled at the National Centre ofAccelerators in Seville (Spain). This cyclotronis mainly used for the production ofradioisotopes for Positron EmissionTomography (PET), but it is also equippedwith an external beamline for interdisciplinaryresearch, producing an 18 MeV proton beamor a 9 MeV deuteron beam.The rationale behind Anna’s project is givenby the necessity of performing studies ofproton Relative Biological Effectiveness (RBE)at low energies, which would help reaching aconsensus on the variation of proton RBEnear the Bragg peak. In current clinicalpractice, the RBE of protons is considered tohave a constant value of 1.1, which meansthat protons are considered to be 10% moreeffective than photons [1] in thedetermination of the same biological effect.The use of a constant RBE value is anapproximation, generally supported by thefact that the available biological data areinsufficient to justify clinically the use of otherproposed approaches [2-3]. There is,however, a large amount of datademonstrating that proton RBE is a complexvariable, which depends on many factors,including tissue type, biological endpoint,dose and radiation [4], and which variestowards the distal Bragg peak region.Therefore, not taking into account thevariations in RBE along the proton beam mayhave important clinical consequences [2-3][5].To perform studies of proton RBE at lowenergies, dedicated beamlines are required,for which special beam optimization anddosimetric techniques are needed. At theNational Centre of Accelerators (CNA)

beamlines of this kind are available at the 3MV tandem and the 18 MeV cyclotronfacilities, which can be adapted to allowreliable measurements and cell irradiations atlow proton energies. The spatial configurationof the two beamlines allows the irradiation ofcells, growing in monolayer cultures placed inPetri dishes and mounted at the exit of thebeamline, orthogonally with respect to thebeam axis. With this configuration, two arethe major constraints when irradiatingbiological samples: low beam intensity, of theorder of some pA, to control properly thefluence within suitable irradiation time scales;and the irradiation field, which has to bebroad enough, of the order of few cm tocover the whole sample, and homogeneous inboth energy and spatial distribution.In the case of the 18 MeV cyclotron externalbeamline, a simple beam line diagnostic andirradiation scheme, based on a completelydefocused beam, external scattering foils andan ionization chamber coupled with EBT3radiochromic films, has been used for thedetermination and measurement of theoptimal beam parameters for radiobiologyexperiments. Measurements of the intensityprofile have been performed using EBT3radiochromic films and a transmissionionization chamber for proton fluenceevaluation. Experiments have been done indifferent irradiation conditions, degrading thebeam with tungsten scattering foils ofdifferent thicknesses, from 50 to 200 µm, andvarying the distance between the exitwindow and the sample.A homogeneous irradiation field, withmaximum deviations around 8% in the wholesample area (3.5 cm of diameter), has beenachieved for a beam energy of around 11MeV and below, and with a feasible beamintensity. In parallel, Monte Carlo simulationsof the beamline have been performed withthe SRIM and Geant4 codes, to be comparedand matched with experimental data.

Research News

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References:[1] International Commission on Radiation Units and Measurements, Prescribing, Recording and Reporting Proton-Beam

Therapy, (ICRU Report 78), J ICRU (2007); 7.[2] G. Giovannini et al., Variable RBE in proton therapy: comparison of different model predictions and their influence on

clinical-like scenarios, Radiation Oncology (2016); 11:68.[3] A. Carabe et al., Range uncertainty in proton therapy due to variable biological effectiveness, Physics in Medicine and

Biology (2012); 57:1159-1172.[4] H. Paganetti, Relative biological effectiveness (RBE) values for proton beam therapy. Variations as a function of

biological endpoint, dose, and linear energy transfer, Physics in Medicine and Biology (2014); 59:R419-R472.[5] M. Wedenberg et al., Disregarding RBE variation in treatment plan comparison may lead to bias in favor of proton

plans, Medical Physics (2014); 41:091706.

These simulations reproduce quite wellexperimental data in what concerns beamprofiles measured with EBT3 radiochromicfilms, with maximum deviations of about 13%and 9%, respectively. Future improvements of

the beamline are still under study; differentsolutions such as changes in the collimationsystem or the installation of a system for thedispersion of the beam inside the beamlinevacuum pipe are currently being considered.

This work is related to OMA deliverable 2.14

Progress with Medipix3: Maximum readout and saving frame rate achievedOMA Fellow Navrit Bal, who is based at ASIin the Netherlands, has carried out studies toincrease the clock frequency of the readoutsystem, SPIDR (Speedy PIxel DetectorReadout) of the Medipix3 detector. He wasable to demonstrate that the system can runat 200 MHz, resulting in a maximum framerate for typical settings (12 bit frames,continuous RW mode) of 2,000 Hz.Previously, the readout software, Dexter, wasoperating at ~1,000 Hz without frame lossand could not save more than ~100 Hz, thus avery significant improvement wasdemonstrated.A higher frame rate has a number ofadvantages for the application of the sensor:It allows imaging of fast moving objects orprocesses, imaging at very high flux or, if theflux is low enough and each radiation eventmakes clusters and not single pixel hits,super-resolution imaging.In his studies, he used the Linux tool ‘perf’ forprofiling and made ‘flamegraphs’. Heoptimized the readout chain by narrowing

down and eliminating or reducing variousperformance bottlenecks. After performanceoptimization, he showed that an increasedmaximum readout and saving rate of up to2,000 Hz is now possible. The sustainednetwork traffic rate in these tests was 6.9Gbit/s! An additional side effect from thisperformance tuning was that the CPU usagewas massively reduced from 60-100% to 15-40%. Future investigations will focus onadditional performance gains through fine-tuning of these new settings.

'Flamegraphs' generated from 'perf' data were found to be an exceptionally useful tool to understand

where CPU time is spent

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2nd Topical Workshop held at CERN

The 2nd OMA Topical Workshop on‘Diagnostics for Beam and PatientMonitoring’ took place at CERN on 4th and5th June 2018. Over 40 delegates attendedthe two-day workshop, including many OMAFellows, who presented and discussedupdates on their respective research projects.This workshop linked together two OMA workpackages: WP2: Beam Imaging Diagnosticsand WP3: Patient Treatment Optimization.The program included a mix of invited andcontributed talks from various OMA partnersand external participants. Technologies fornon-invasive particle beam imaging werepresented, showing very promising resultsfrom OMA Fellows. Innovations based onprompt gamma imaging were also discussedas a method of treatment monitoring.Invited talks linked research and developmentwith state-of-the-art clinical treatments.Several industry-based talks gave insight as tothe latest developments in clinical hadrontherapy. Along the main workshop topic there

was a session on knowledge exchange,discussing how expertise at CERN and inwider research can be developed intopartnerships with Industry.The workshop included lively discussion andcross collaboration opportunities betweenOMA Fellows in the fascinating researchenvironment of CERN.Professor Carsten Welsch, OMA Coordinator,says: "There is a growing need ofcollaboration between different researchcommunities to address some verychallenging questions in ion beam therapy. Inthis workshop we brought together expertsspecialized in monitoring patients with thosedeveloping technologies for imaging theparticle beam used for the treatment. We sawlively discussions throughout the event andmany ideas of how to enhance existingmonitoring systems. OMA organizes a numberof challenge-based workshops and it is apleasure to see the interesting research ideasemerging from these discussions."

Network News

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CosyLab Academy held at CERNFrom the 6th – 8th June, COSYLAB organizedan academy for the OMA Fellows tointroduce them to a control systemarchitecture widely used in researchinstitutes and proton treatment facilitiesacross the world. COSYLAB, a company withmore than 150 based in Ljubljana, Sloveniaprovides system integration and customeradapted products and solutions, covering thecomplete area of control systems andinstrumentation, specialized in accelerators,both for particle therapy and scientificresearch, as well as tokamaks and radiotelescopes.The Fellows received training in EPICS. EPICSis a worldwide collaboration that sharesdesigns, software tools, and expertise forimplementing large-scale control systems.The software toolkit is a Control SystemArchitecture with an efficient communicationprotocol (Channel Access) for passing dataand distributing real-time database ofmachine values.

The teaching included getting to know thestructure and vocabulary of EPICS as well ashand on programming to develop a smallEPICS application on temperature monitoringand cooling of a room.It was a good opportunity to see the interfacebetween diagnostics that are beingdeveloped within the OMA project and theintegration in a system network of a facilitythat is crucial for a smooth and safe workingenvironment.

The 3rd and Final two-day Topical Workshopon ‘Accelerator Design & Diagnostics’ willlook into the efficient integration of thedevices developed in Work Package 2 (Beamimaging and diagnostics) into the facilities,beam lines and gantries from Work Package 4(Facility design and optimization). Thediscussion will focus on how to improve theuse beam and patient diagnostics to design(and operate) ion beam treatment facilities.

The workshop is mandatory for all OMAFellows in WP2 and WP4; all other Fellows arewelcome to attend.

A limited number of places will be offered toexternal participants.

More information and how to register willsoon be available via our webpage.

Upcoming OMA Event

3rd OMA Topical Workshop - Accelerator Design and Diagnostics11th - 12th December, GSI, Germany

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Other Events

AVA topical workshop CIVIDEC15th - 17th October 2018, Cividec, Vienna

The AVA project is delighted to announce athree-day Topical Workshop on diagnosticsand detectors in storage rings, beam linesand experiments.

The event will be hosted by AVA partnerCIVIDEC in Vienna, 15th - 17th October 2018.It will cover the challenges in the design andoperation of advanced detectors and beaminstrumentation to optimize the performanceof the AD and ELENA, as well as experimentaloutput.

This research challenges-focused event willcombined talks by research leaders,opportunities for early stage researchers to

present their work, and panel discussions.

Further information can be found here:

https://indico.cern.ch/event/726019/

Fellows Activity

Broadening the OMA training through expert coursesSudharsan Srinivasan, OMA Fellow based atPSI, attended a two day certified NI LabVIEWcourse with hands on experiments andprogramming. The course focused on dataacquisition using NI-MAX; a measurementand automation explorer tool and LabVIEWprogramming to remotely control and acquiredata from measurement instruments thatwere provided by National Instruments. Thiscourse will come handy for the test benchcharacterization of beam diagnostic devicesthat Sudharsan is currently developing for thePROSCAN facility at PSI.

Sudharsan also took part in a ResearchIntegrity course that focuses on ethicalscience and research activities. This courseemphasizes the importance of fairness,honesty, reliability, openness, confidentiality,non-discrimination, responsible mentoringand publication, and objectivity to name afew and hence covered a number of skills thatare not normally covered in PGR trainingprograms.

PSI

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In March 2018 OMA Fellow Giulia Arico’spent 2 days at the University of Pavia,Physics Department, to work with Prof FBallarini and Dr M Carante on somedevelopment of the FLUKA Monte Carlo codefor biophysics applications. In particular, thisproject aims at offering the possibility ofperforming biological studies on the RelativeBiological Effectiveness (RBE) and cell survivalcurves for hadron therapy with FLUKA. FLUKAhas been used at CNAO (Pavia, Italy), HIT(Heidelberg, Germany) and MIT (Marburg,Germany) for similar studies using the LEMmodel developed for heavy ions at GSI(Darmstadt, Germany). In the case of LEM,the dependency of the RBE on the particleenergy is crucial, and the alpha and betaparameters, which vary for different tissuesand tumours, are calculated for heavy ionsusing data from conventional photonradiotherapy. The alpha and beta termsdetermine the curvature of the cell survivalcurve.

The research group at the University of Paviais developing an alternative approach for celldeath studies, called BIophysical ANalysis ofCell death and chromosome Aberration(BIANCA). As the name suggests, in theBIANCA simulations the cell death is linked tothe chromosome aberrations andexperimental data are used for comparison.The results obtained with BIANCA can beused to complement and as comparison tothe results obtained with the LEM model.Moreover, coupling of BIANCA with FLUKAcould allow to predict cell survival curves andRBE for hadron therapy.This experience was useful and very satisfyingfor the Fellow Giulia. She gained a deeperknowledge on radiation damage andbiophysical models. Moreover, the initialresults achieved are promising for a fruitfulcollaboration between BIANCA and FLUKAdevelopers.

Combining BIANCA with FLUKA improves understanding of Biological Effects of Radiation

CREAM-1 Hackathon in Belfast

OMA Fellow Jacinta Yap and LIVDAT FellowSelina Dhinsey attended the ComputingRadiation Effects to Advance Medicine(CREAM) workshop at Queen’s University,Belfast from the 3rd – 6th April 2018.

Supported by the UK Global ChallengeNetwork+ in Advanced Radiotherapy, it was aweek of exciting discussion and buddingcollaborations starting with an introductoryworkshop to TOPAS (Tool For ParticleSimulation). TOPAS is an innovative softwarebuilt on top of Geant4, allowing users similarcapabilities but in a computing environmentwhich is more user-friendly and easy to learn;an advantageous feature particularly for aclinical setting. Step by step exercisesdemonstrated the capabilities of the tool,allowing users to simulate particle beams invarious setups and interactions with a rangeof materials.

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Last month PTCOG57 was held in Cincinnati,Ohio, USA from 21st – 26th May. Organizedby the Particle Therapy Co-Operative Group,this annual conference is a majorinternational meeting which brings togetherthose in the field of particle radiotherapy;physicists, medical professionals, specializedvendors, scientists and researchers alike. The

week started with the educational session forthe first three days, providing a goodoverview of relevant themes such as thephysics, radiobiology, technology and clinicalaspects in particle therapy. This was followedby the scientific meeting which includednumerous talks from experts and researchersas well as a poster session.

Jacinta Yap at PTCOG57

Jacinta Yap presenting a talk at PTCOG57.

Invited talks were also given by Joseph Perland Jan Schuemann who have worked on theGeant4 collaboration and development ofTOPAS and TOPAS-nbio respectively.Professor Schuemann introduced TOPAS-nBio, an extension of TOPAS which worksdown at the micro- and nanometre scales,allowing beam-cell interactions to bemodelled. The latter 2 days focused on a‘hackathon’ in which small projects anddiscussions of mutual research interests weresetup. It also facilitated future collaborations,bringing together institutions withcomplimentary research and allowingexperience to be shared between those in the

fields of radiobiology and medical physics.

Jacinta’s project focuses on simulation studiesof beam behaviour to correlate the beamhalo to the core for integration of the VELOonline beam monitor. These studies willprovide a good understanding of the physicsand the beam, linking to Selina’s LIVDATproject exploring the radiobiological aspectsof proton therapy. The week was an insightfulexperience for both University of LiverpoolPhDs, providing the opportunity to networkand also learn more about this Monte Carlotool relevant to their research in simulating aproton therapy beam and cell interactions.

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The last FLUKA beginners’ course, hosted bythe Stellenbosh University in South Africa,attracted 30 students, mainly from SouthAfrica and Europe, but also Zimbabwe,Brazil, China, Qatar. OMA Fellow Giulia Arico’was one of the co-organizers and one of thespeakers of the course.This experience was demanding but alsoambitious for Giulia. She needed to refine herplanning skills: students registration,scheduling of the course program, search ofthe event’s venue and organization of thestudents’ accommodation are just some ofthe tasks in which Giulia was involved.Moreover, planning time and respectingdeadlines, managing costs and expensesaccording to the available budget are some ofthe responsibilities that Giulia had to dealwith during the organization process.Preparation of the lectures and exercises for

the course was another challenge Giuliaencountered. Moreover, she needed todeepen her learning and to gain someexpertise on fields beyond her research area,like high energy physics, induced radioactivityand neutrino physics.

Giulia Arico’ as a teacher at the 20thFLUKA beginners’ course in South Africa

Giulia presenting a talk at FLUKA beginners’ course in South Africa.

OMA Fellow Jacinta Yap had the opportunityto give a talk on “Implementation of a Non-invasive Online Beam Monitor at a 60 MeVProton therapy beamline” during the secondquality assurance session. She presentedpreliminary simulations, results and thedevelopment of the LHCb VELO detector as astandalone online beam monitor for particletherapy applications. This work contributes toher research as part of the OMA project, todevelop and optimize beam diagnostic toolsfor particle accelerators. For the VELO beammonitor, Jacinta’s work focuses on theintegration of the system and in particular,the particle transport and tracking of thebeam as transported through to the deliverysystem.

This is essential to be able to ultimatelycorrelate halo measurements to the core ofthe beam in order to monitor the protonbeam dose delivery in real time.The conference was also joined by severalOMA network partners, including FellowLaurent Kelleter from UCL. It was a greatplatform to learn more about the currentlandscape of particle therapy, recentinnovations, technology and clinical advances.The significant international involvement alsoshowed what work is being done in the fieldacross the world to address the challengesassociated with particle radiotherapy.

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For one night a year, research institutes,museums and university faculties in Dresdenare opening their gates to welcomeeveryone to learn more about the latestresearch and science projects. This so-called‘Long Night of the Sciences’ attracts everyyear thousands of “small and big researchers”to visit the different research facilities of thecity. With its unique particle therapy systemand the special emphasis on research,OncoRay is also opening its gates foreveryone who would like to have a look onproton therapy and the different researchprojects performed. On 15th of June this year,it was again possible to learn more aboutprinciples of particle therapy and to visit theproton treatment facility – a uniqueopportunity, as it is usually not accessible forthe public.Johannes Petzold, OMA Fellow based at IBA,took the opportunity to join the ‘Long Nightof the Sciences’ at OncoRay to discuss andpresent the basic principles of protontherapy. During the whole evening, heexplained the basics of dose deposition,patient treatment, and his own researchwithin OMA.

The general idea behind protons was of mostinterest, especially the question about thedifferences to conventional radiation therapybut also the necessity of research to furtherimprove the therapy. Furthermore, thevisitors had the chance to win small prizes bysolving a small quiz with the help of theexperts or by accelerating marbles in amechanical cyclotron.

The event was a great success and severalhundred visitors came during the evening toOncoRay to learn more about the latestresearch.

Johannes explaining his research to participants at the ‘Long Night of Sciences’.

Proton therapy in focus during ‘Long Night of the Sciences’ in Dresden

A visit to the iThemba Labs was alsoorganized for all participants as part of thecourse. The control, experimental and clinicalareas were visited under the guide of localscientists, who showed themselves to be veryhospitable and willing to answer to the manyarising questions.This course was an amazing experience forGiulia, and gave her the possibility of training

her abilities and performance under pressure.It was also a valuable opportunity forenhancing her general knowledge on physics,and for expanding her professional network.Giulia was impressed by the strong desire tolearn and high motivation of most of thestudents in the course. After so much hardwork, the positive feedback and attitude ofthe participants was thrilling and gratifying.

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OMA Fellows Jacinta and Laurent presenting their posters at ENLIGHT2018.

From 25th to 27th of June, the annualENLIGHT Meeting and Training took place atthe OMA beneficiary institution UniversityCollege London (UCL). ENLIGHT is an acronymfor European Network for Light Ion HadronTherapy. The network has been established atCERN in order to coordinate the Europeanefforts in hadron therapy. Two OMA Fellows,Jacinta Yap (University of Liverpool) andLaurent Kelleter (UCL) had the opportunity toparticipate in the 16th annual ENLIGHTmeeting since its foundation in 2002.Jacinta contributed to the conference with aposter on the simulation of the Clatterbridgebeam line, which has been developed incollaboration with Simon Jolly and MathieuHentz from UCL. Laurent presented a posterand gave a talk about the development of ascintillator-based range telescope for qualityassurance in proton therapy.The first day of the meeting was dedicated tohands-on training on proton therapy. Itincluded talks on the clinical and physicspotential of proton therapy, quality assurancein clinical trials and the public perception ofproton therapy in the UK, to name just a few.

The day was rounded up by a demonstrationof the Eclipse treatment planning system byVarian.The second day focused on dosimetry,imaging and patient selection. Clinicians andscientists from multiple proton and ioncentres across Europe and the USA reportedabout their experience and practise. After along day of interesting talks and livelydiscussions, the conference participantsenjoyed a boat cruise on the river Thamesthrough the British capital.On the final meeting day, there were sessionson combined radio- and immunotherapy, thedifferences of treatment with different lightions and paediatrics.The whole meeting was live-blogged onTwitter where details on the talks can befound under the hash tag #ENLIGHT2018 orby following the PART group@ProtonAdvancedRT. The full program canbe looked up underhttps://indico.cern.ch/event/659363/. Thenext year’s meeting will be hosted by thethen brand new proton therapy facility ofCaen, France.

OMA Fellows at ENLIGHT 2018

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Partner News

Dr Miguel A. Cortés-Giraldo receives research award

Dr Miguel A. Cortés-Giraldo, OMAsupervisor, has been awarded with the 2017Young Researcher Prize by the RoyalAcademy of Science of Seville in a ceremonywhich took place on 23rd May 2018. Thisprize is given to researchers under the age of35 whose affiliation and/or research activity isrelated with Seville.Dr Cortés-Giraldo earned his PhD in NuclearPhysics in 2011 and is one of the supervisorsof the project carried out by OMA FellowAnna Baratto, focused on the preparation of abeam line setup optimized for radiobiologyexperiments with proton beams at the 18/9

MeV cyclotron facility at CNA (Seville). Hismain research interests are related with theapplication of Monte Carlo simulations to thefields of proton and ion radiation therapy,especially in what concerns modelling oftreatment plans including radiobiologicaleffects and radiation quality description.Some of these works are carried out with theRoberts Proton Therapy Center of theUniversity of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, PA,USA). He is also a member of the Geant4 andn_TOF collaborations.

Congratulations!

Credit: Diario de Sevilla

France chooses CNAO as a scientific partnerA partnership has been created betweenItaly and France in order to study tumourswhich non-operable and resistant toradiation therapy.Italy is one of the 4 countries in the worldtogether with China, Japan and Germany, tohave the accelerator for the production ofcarbon ions used in oncology, which can beused to treat cancers which are inoperableand resistant to X-ray radiotherapy. French

patients will come to CNAO to receivetreatments with carbon ion therapy.France, which does not yet have thistechnology, has decided to launch aninternational study to compare theeffectiveness of carbon ion therapy(adrotherapy) with that of radiotherapy withphotons and protons and has chosen Italy andCNAO, Centro National OncologicalAdrotherapy as scientific partners.

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The research, which takes the name of"Etoile", involves the enrollment of patientsin France that will be divided into 2 groups,one of which will be treated with moreadvanced and precise forms of radiotherapyon the target (radiation therapy with protonsor with photons) and the other with a furtherevolution of anti-cancer therapies, that is, theadrotherapy with carbon ions. The people ofthe second group will be treated at CNAO,which has already welcomed over 1800patients since 2011.

At the centre of the study are the non-operable or non-fully operable cases oftumours such as cystic adenoid carcinomas ofthe head and neck, soft tissue sarcomas,osteosarcomas, chondrosarcomas andchordomas of the spine or sacrum. The study,funded by Assurance Maladie, the FrenchMinistry of Health and French organizationsNetSarc-ResOs and Refcor, will last 7 years.The international research coordinator isPascal Pommier, radiotherapist, of the CentreLéon Bérard of Lyon.

Dr Christian Graeff honoured for his scientific achievementsOMA Steering Committee member DrChristian Graeff (GSI) has been honored forhis scientific achievements with the Günthervon Pannewitz Award of the German Societyof Radiation Oncology (DEGRO). The awardwas presented in recognition of his researchon the use of ion beams to treat cardiacarrhythmia.The Günther von Pannewitz Award, which isendowed with €1,000, is presented inrecognition of outstanding research workdevoted to radiation therapy for non-malignant diseases, including radiation

biology, radiation physics, and clinicalresearch. The presentation of this awardhonours the lifetime achievement of theFreiburg-based radiologist Günther vonPannewitz.Dr Graeff accepted the award at the DEGROannual congress in Leipzig.

Congratulations!

Full article can be found herehttps://www.gsi.de/en/start/news/

Award ceremony Photo: MCI

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Medical Experts discuss future R&D directions

A workshop on “Ions for cancer therapy,space research and material science” tookplace from June 19th -21st 2018 in Archamps,France, in the vicinity of Geneva. The eventwas hosted by the European ScientificInstitute (ESI) and organized within theframework of ARIES and ENLIGHT. Ithighlighted the increasingly importantinterface between fundamental physicsresearch and medical applications.Over recent decades many importantdevelopments have been built on either basicphysics principles or the tools developed toconduct physics research. Notable examplesare diagnostic and therapeutic techniquessuch as particle therapy or innovations inspace and material sciences. CERN and GSI,two laboratories that pioneered ion beambased cancer therapy since the early '90s, co-organized this workshop which attractedmore than 60 experts from all over the world.On the first day, reports from leading clinicalfacilities such as OMA partners CNAO andMedaustron in Italy, as well as the HeidelbergIon Therapy center HIT in Heidelberg,Germany were given. This formed anexcellent basis for discussion of specific

technical and technological challenges, suchas efficient ion sources, different technologychoices for linear and circular accelerators, aswell as challenges related to beam deliverysystems. Two sessions then focused on theparticular R&D challenges related tosynchrotrons and gantry design withdiscussions continuing until 19:00 on thesecond day. OMA Steering Committeemember Dr Christian Graeff, who was alsomember of the Programme Committee, gavea talk on "Helium as a range probe".The final day of the workshop focused onfuture directions in ion therapy, as well asaccelerator development. OMA CoordinatorProfessor Carsten Welsch talked about"European medical accelerator networks anddesign perspectives" where he emphasizedthe role OMA can play.The event provided an ideal opportunity toexchange ideas, share current experiencesand explore future possibilities for the designof a next generation medical research andtherapy facility with ions in Europe. Allpresentations are now available via theworkshop homepage.

Vacancies

PhD position at the University of LiverpoolDielectric laser acceleration of relativistic beamsMore information can be found here:https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/quasar/vacancies/vacancies/

Early Stage Researcher Fellowship within the AVA project at Cosylab d.d.Development of a versatile control systemMore information can be found here: https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/ava/projects/cosylab/

PhD Position at OncoRayHelmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, Germany https://www.hzdr.de/ is gladly welcoming applications for a new PhD position in medical physics at its Institute of Radiooncology – Oncorayhttps://www.oncoray.de/, a leading proton therapy research centre in Germany and adjunct partner of the OMA project.Interested candidates should email the lead researcher Dr Richter Christian.Richter@OncoRay.de

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This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 675265.

Project CoordinatorProf Carsten P. Welsch

carsten.welsch@cockcroft.ac.uk

Newsletter EditorAlexandra Welsch

alexandra.welsch@cockcroft.ac.uk

www.oma-project.eu

OMA Events

December 11th - 12th 2018 3rd OMA Topical Workshop - Accelerator Design and Diagnostics, GSI, Germany

March 2019 3rd OMA School – Particle Therapy, MedAustron, Vienna, Austria

June 24th – 25th 2019 Advanced Researcher Skills and Technology Transfer Workshops, Liverpool, UK

June 28th 2019 Symposium: Accelerators for Science and Society, Liverpool, UK

Other Events

July 23rd - Sept 13th 2018 Summer Student Program, GSI / FAIR, Germany

Oct 15th - 17th 2018 AVA Topical Workshop: Detectors & Diagnostics, CIVIDEC, Vienna, Austria

May 19th – 24th 2019 Melbourne Convention & Exhibition Centre, Australia

June 10th - 15th 2019 PTCOG58, Manchester, UK

July 1st - 3rd 2019 ENLIGHT Annual Meeting and Training, Caen, France

NOTICE BOARD

This newsletter is published on a quarterly basis. Help us keep it interesting by providing your news and updates.

DEADLINE FOR THE NEXT NEWSLETTER 15th September 2018