Speaker
Description
Originating from high-energy and nuclear-physics domains, Geant4 is being adopted with increasing interest in the medical physics community, where it continues to gain significant momentum. Of particular interest to the medical physicists is its completeness, with a physics engine that covers the hadronic and nuclear interactions, of particular interest for novel ideas and techniques in the medical sector. Typical applications range from dosimetry to nanodosimetry, imaging to radiation protection and hadron therapy. Validation and performance monitoring focused on physics quantities relevant to this domain are of crucial need. In addition, it is important to identify the most appropriate physics models for a specific medical physics application. To respond to these needs, we developed G4-Med, an automated benchmarking tool and regression testing system of Geant4 for medical physics. The test suite currently includes tests cases covering from fundamental physical quantities (e.g. cross-section, point-dose-kernels), to semi-realistic set-ups typical of medical physics applications. Both electromagnetic and hadronic physics processes are tested and validated against experimental data. G4_Med is automated by means of the geant-val platform (https://geant-val.cern.ch/layouts) which is already used for regression testing of the Geant4 hadronic physics.
This talk will describe the general structure of G4_Med, its current status, and integration with validation efforts of the larger Geant4 community, with emphasis on the aspects relevant for nuclear physics. Outlook and future prospects will also be discussed.
