{"id":187,"date":"2024-08-23T02:46:19","date_gmt":"2024-08-23T02:46:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/danielspace.org\/?p=187"},"modified":"2024-09-28T20:56:53","modified_gmt":"2024-09-28T20:56:53","slug":"summer-project-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/danielspace.org\/?p=187","title":{"rendered":"Summer Project 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Radiation exposure of patients from computed tomography for COVID-19 diagnosis<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After we made it through the COVID-19 pandemic, I found out that many kids had to get special x-ray pictures called CT scans to help doctors check for the virus. Their parents are worried that the radiation from these scans might affect their kids’ health. So, I reached out to Dr. Jae Won Jung, who works in the Radiation Oncology Department at East Carolina University, to ask if I could study this issue with his help during the summer of 2023. With Dr. Jae Won Jung’s approval, I started researching to learn more about the radiation from CT scans. I gathered basic radiation measurements, called CTDI, from many articles, and then used a special dose calculator to figure out how much radiation different parts of the body were exposed to during these scans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is the CTDIvol distribution for kids who had CT scans using the “standard dose protocol.” Next is the CTDIvol distribution for scans done with the “low dose protocol.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Here’s the organ-level radiation burden, called dose in unit of mGy, for adult patients who received CT radiation using standard (top) and low (bottom) dose protocols.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We found that kids received about 1.5-times greater dose than the adults received.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After completing a successful summer internship, I worked on a research paper with Dr. Jung\u2019s guidance. Our paper was then presented at the American Association of Physicists in Medicine Annual Meeting, which took place in Los Angeles, CA, during the summer of 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I have managed to finish a full manuscript and Dr. Jung and I successfully published the paper to Radiation Physics and Chemistry journal (Impact Factor 2.8). Below is the PDF copy of my paper!<\/p>\n\n\n\n