Study on physical penumbra of radiation therapy

Proper evaluation about the penumbra is very important to improve the efficacy of radiation therapy. There are two kinds of physical penumbra, geometric penumbra and transmission penumbra. In this study, we evaluated the variation of physical penumbra according to the varing energy level, changing the field size and depth. Physical penumbra width was decreased as the source size decreased, and as the SDD increased, but the consideration about the scatter radiation and mechanical stability is an important factor. For the two adjacent beams, upper collimator should be used and especially for Co-60 unit, it is efficient to use the extended collimator