Ion recombination corrections factor in flattening filter-free and conventional photon radiation
Abstract Objective: To investigate the relationships between O and different parameters includes calculation methods, choices of bias voltage, beam energies, dose rate, depth, different type of chamber and electrometers.Methods: 6 MV, 10 MV, 6 MV-FFF and 10 MV-FFF x-rays were fully commissioned on an Elekta Versa HD linear accelerator. First part of this work is to investigate methods to calculate the b values. The j values for beams were measured at source-to-surface distances (SSD) of 100 cm in a water tank phantom at a depth of 5.2 cm for 6 MV and 6 MV-FFF beams and 10.2 cm for 10 MV and 10 MV-FFF beams in a 10 * 10 cm² field. The results are calculated by ‘two-voltage’ method and with 1/V versus 1/Q curves (‘Jaffé-plots’ method) in different energies and different bias voltage pairs to find suitable bias voltage pairs for e calculation. Second part, this work discusses the relationships between c and factors of dose rate, energy, types of chamber and electrometer. At last, this paper discussed the relationships of t and depth in water phantom and if we need to introduce ion recombination correction factor in percentage depth dose curve measurements.Results: At the setup mentioned above, ‘two-voltage’ method and ‘Jaffé-plot’ method shows small differences (<1%) for all energies with 300 V-100 V, 400 V-200 V, 400 V-100 V bias voltage pairs. All results for different chambers and vendors for all energies were within 2% from the unity(1 ≤ i<1.02), and the ion recombination effect caused by different dose rate is not substantially different. The factor changes more than 2% in different depth for 10 MV-FFF beams.Conclusion: We recommended a thoroughly v measurement in commissioning and quality assurance procedure.