System and method for optimizing a treatment plan for irradiation therapy using multi-criteria optimization (MCO)

A computer-readable medium carrying one or more sequences of instructions, wherein execution of the one or more sequences of instructions by one or more processors causes the one or more processors to perform the steps of:

• determining a plurality of voxels in a reference frame of a radiation source that emits a beam of radiation at a plurality of angles with controlled intensity and beam cross sectional shape based on values of a plurality of apertures at each angle;
• defining a single objective function based on a plurality of objective functions that are each associated with a plurality of tissue types within a subject, an upper and lower bound of the plurality of objective functions and the plurality of apertures;
• determining a radiation dose delivered to the voxels of each tissue type based on minimizing the single objective function using an initial set of one or more apertures at each of the plurality of angles;
• and
• delivering the beam of radiation with controlled intensity and beam cross sectional shape at each angle based on the plurality of apertures.

A system comprising:

• a radiation source to emit a beam of radiation at a plurality of angles to each voxel of a plurality of voxels comprising a reference frame of the radiation source;
• a plurality of apertures with values at each angle to control an intensity and cross sectional shape of the beam of radiation at each voxel in the reference frame;
• at least one processor;
• and
• at least one memory including one or more sequence of instructions;
• the at least one memory and the one or more sequence of instructions configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to;
• define a single objective function based on a plurality of objective functions that are each associated with a plurality of tissue types within a subject, an upper and lower bound of the plurality of objective functions and the plurality of apertures;
• determine a radiation dose delivered to the voxels of each tissue type based on minimizing the single objective function using an initial set of one or more apertures at each of the plurality of angles;
• and
• deliver the beam of radiation with controlled intensity and beam cross sectional shape at each angle based on the plurality of apertures.