Micron-scale Detection and Advanced Radio-Therapy of Micro-DART.

Micron-scale Detection and Advanced Radiotherapy – Micro-DART Proposal XUV Lasers – Fort Collins, CO   This Phase II SBIR XL proposal will create & validate the critical technologies that would enable state-of-the-art, compact laser-Compton x-ray systems similar to those that have been previously developed as part of the DARPA Gamma-ray Inspection Technologies Program (GRIT) to BOTH rapidly produce micron-scale, x-ray, phase-contrast images of clinical and industrial relevance and to demonstrate that the underlying Very High Energy Electron (VHEE) beam is capable of producing FLASH-relevant doses of radiation for potential cancer treatment.  Individually, each of these capabilities have been highly sought by industry leaders yet have no present commercial, clinical counterpart. The facts that both capabilities can be obtained from one device, presents the truly revolutionary possibility of one device being used to concurrently detect and treat cancer without ever having to move the patient. The results of this SBIR in Subtopic Area 1 would bring the imaging hardware, patient interface, detectors and electron beam manipulation technology for a clinical system to production-ready maturity and potentially establish XUV Lasers as the primary OEM supplier for this application space. The results of this SBIR in Subtopic Area 2 would bring the required high-average-power laser technologies that enable rapid image generation for any application to production-ready maturity & establish XUV Lasers as a key OEM supplier for such systems. While the initial commercial targets of this work are clinical, the proposed imaging activities could be used to demonstrate propagation-based phase contrast imaging at x-ray energies ranging from as low as 10 keV to over 300 keV. As such this work will also have applicability to a range of semiconductor metrology and industrial imaging applications. The development of compact, VHEE beams in the 100 MeV range along with the magnet systems with which to manipulate them outside of the accelerator would enable precision stereotactic, VHEE FLASH radiotherapy with highly localized dose profiles at the target & low irradiation at the surface. Such profiles are currently only available from significantly more expensive (~$150M) proton therapy facilities. These capabilities require unique laser-Compton source and accelerator capabilities that heretofore have not been available but have been recently enabled by the DARPA GRIT program. It is anticipated that the proposed imaging and therapy platforms would become key OEM components of resulting clinical systems produced by other vendors, such as Lumitron Technologies, Inc.  With an install base of around 150,000 modern CT and MRI machines around the world, the potential OEM market for these components and systems in the clinical space alone is large. There is no existing commercial vendor of any of the systems described in this proposal anywhere in the world.