Marco Serpa-Lopez
Position
Medical Physics MSc Thesis Student (Clinical)
Qualifications
MSc Part I (Medical Physics)
Contact Details
Room: Based at University Hospital Hamburg-Eppendorf
Email: marco.serpalopez@pg.canterbury.ac.nz
Research
Investigation of the Suitability of Gating and Real-time Tracking for the Compensation of Breathing-induced Motion, in collaboration with University of Hamburg and the University of Wuerzburg., 2010 – 2011
Supervisors: Juergen Meyer, Florian Cremers, Kurt Baier
Profile
Marco completed a Bachelors in Science in Physics at the University of Auckland in 2008. After completing his studies at Auckland, Marco moved to Christchurch to pursue a career in Medical Physics at the University of Canterbury (UC). During the first part of his postgraduate studies at UC, Marco had the chance to meet people undertaking cutting edge research, which inspired him to develop an interest in radiation therapy (RT) of mobile tumours.
Marco’s research is related to respiratory gated RT and tumour tracking for the compensation of breathing-induced motion of tumours in the lung. Respiratory gating has the potential to reduce irradiation of healthy lung tissue surrounding the tumour, which may facilitate margin reduction and ultimately dose escalation. However, the unpredictable behaviour of respiration and induced tumour motion presents a series of limitations to existing gating modalities that have discouraged many users. This study highlights the need for real-time monitoring of the tumour position during treatment and investigates a clinical tool for treatment verification to maximise the potential benefits of respiratory gated RT. This is accomplished with a dedicated software package capable of tracking tumours in portal images exposed by the treatment beam. The overall aim is to investigate the potential and suitability of the approach for tumour tracking and position verification during gated beam delivery.
