We introduce a novel learning framework for accelerated Monte Carlo (MC) dose calculation termed Energy-Shifting. This approach leverages deep learning to synthesize highly complex polyenergetic dose distributions directly from simple monoenergetic inputs under identical beam configurations. Unlike conventional denoising techniques, which rely on noisy low-count dose maps that compromise beam profile integrity, our method achieves superior cross-domain generalization on unseen datasets by integrating high-fidelity anatomical textures and source-specific beam similarity into the model's input space. Furthermore, we propose a novel 3D architecture termed TransUNetSE3D, featuring Transformer blocks for global context and Residual Squeeze-and-Excitation (SE) modules for adaptive channel-wise feature recalibration. Hierarchical representations of these blocks are fused into the network's latent space alongside the primary dose-map parameters, allowing physics-aware reconstruction. This hybrid design outperforms existing UNet and Transformer-based benchmarks in both spatial precision and structural preservation, while maintaining the execution speed necessary for real-time use. Our proposed pipeline achieves a Gamma Passing Rate exceeding 98% (3%/3mm) compared to the MC reference, evaluated within the framework of a treatment planning system (TPS) using 6MV TrueBeam Lineac Accelerator (LINAC) for prostate radiotherapy. These results offer a robust solution for fast volumetric dosimetry in adaptive radiotherapy.
Figures & tables
Fig. 1: Overview of the architecture of the proposed TransUNetSE3D.
Fig. 2: Illustration of an axial slice predicted using the same training/testing protocol by different learning approaches : denoising and Energy-Shifting trained and evaluated on Head dataset. The first row shows CT scan, the input of two approaches and the reference dose. The second row shows the prediction of each approach without/with CT scan. The last row shows the absolute difference between the predictions and the reference.
Learning
Training set : Head
Testing set
approachs
Input types
Head
Pelvis
Denoising
Low-sampling TrueBeam
52.83
49.64
Low-sampling TrueBeam, CT
56.43
46.33
Energy-Shifting
Mono beam
56.68
48.63
Mono beam, CT
57.84
50.51
TABLE I: Quantitative evaluation using PSNR ( dB ) of UNet3D-based learning methods trained on dataset Head and then tested on two datasets Head and Pelvis with respect to different input types.
Fig. 3: Illustration of an axial slice predicted by different architectures using UNet3D, ResidualUNet3D, UNETR, SwinUNETR and TransUNetSE3D trained and tested on Head dataset. We show the zoom regions in the slices at the left corner by a red border.
Training set : Head
Testing set
Loss function
Head
Pelvis
Mean squared error (MSE)
57.44
48.71
Mean absolute error (MAE)
57.84
50.51
TABLE II: Quantitative evaluation using PSNR ( dB ) of UNet3D-based Energy-Shifting learning methods trained on dataset Head and then tested on two datasets Head and Pelvis with respect to different loss functions. The best results are highlighted in bold.
Fig. 4: Illustration of an axial slice predicted by different architectures using the same training/testing protocol : UNet3D, ResidualUNet3D, UNETR, SwinUNETR and TransUNetSE3D trained on Head dataset and tested on Pelvis dataset. We show the zoom regions in the slices at the right corner by a red border.
Training set : Head
Testing set
Architectures
Head
Pelvis
PSNR ↑
GPR ↑
PSNR ↑
GPR ↑
Mono-energetic input
33.91
24.1588
34.95
16.4977
UNet3D
57.84
99.0762
50.51
74.8951
ResidualUNet3D
57.94
99.3584
51.78
84.8667
UNETR
58.11
99.3597
50.02
75.9518
TABLE III: Quantitative evaluation using PSNR (dB) and GPR (%) of the proposed Energy-Shifting method with respect to different architectures trained on dataset Head and then tested on two datasets Head and Pelvis. The best results are highlighted in bold. The compared methods utilize the same input features, loss function and training/evaluation protocol.
Architectures
Parameters
Model size
Exec. time
UNet3D
65.86 M
251.233
10.9816
ResidualUNet3D
113.72 M
433.821
10.8076
UNETR
160.03 M
610.472
12.7666
SwinUNETR
113.57 M
440.422
19.6291
TransUNetSE3D
165.75 M
632.282
13.1340
TABLE IV: Number of parameters, model size (in Mb) and average execution time in seconds (s) of compared methods.
Architectures
Testing set
Head
Pelvis
Training set : Head
PSNR ↑
GPR ↑
PSNR ↑
GPR ↑
ResidualUNet3D (Baseline)
57.94
99.3584
51.78
84.8667
Baseline + SE
58.75
99.5684
52.27
85.5630
Baseline + SE + Beam Block
58.70
99.5731
51.95
86.4524
Baseline + SE + Trans. Block
58.86
99.6080
51.75
85.2394
TABLE V: Ablation study on the proposed TransUnetSE3D. The best results and the second best results are highlighted in bold and in italic respectively.
Fig. 5: Illustration of gamma index analysis and relative error between (a) Monte Carlo reference and (b) the dose prediction from the Energy-Shifting using TransUNetSE3D. The dose map consists of six beams targeted at the prostate volume, described as (f) the segmentation map of (c) CT scan.
Fig. 6: Illustration of dose-volume histogram (DVH) of Monte Carlo simulation and whose of the proposed energy shifting with respect to the organs at risk (OARs) : prostate, bladder, rectum, left femoral head and right femoral head. The DVH is plotted using PlatiPy [ 10 ] .
Mean dose (Gy) ± standard deviation
OARs
Energy-Shifting
Monte Carlo reference
Prostate
40.8245 ± 3.1708
40.8380 ± 3.1641
Rectum
13.7212 ± 8.0357
13.6158 ± 7.9370
Bladder
2.3429 ± 4.8029
2.3644 ± 4.7858
Left femoral head
4.1969 ± 7.1156
4.2091 ± 7.1079
Right femoral head
7.6668 ± 9.0723
7.6809 ± 9.0744
TABLE VI: Mean dose calculation (Gy) with respect to different OARs : prostate, rectum, bladder, left femoral head and right femoral head using the clinical planning system for the prostate radiotherapy.
Department of Radiation Oncology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria · Christian Doppler Laboratory for Image and Knowledge Driven Precision Radiation Oncology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria · Department of Diagnostics and Intervention, Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden