MINERVA: a multi-modality plugin-based radiation therapy treatment planning system.

Researchers at the INEEL, MSU, LLNL and UCD have undertaken development of MINERVA, a patient-centric, multi-modal, radiation treatment planning system, which can be used for planning and analysing several radiotherapy modalities, either singly or combined, using common treatment planning tools. It employs an integrated, lightweight plugin architecture to accommodate multi-modal treatment planning using standard interface components. The design also facilitates the future integration of improved planning technologies. The code is being developed with the Java programming language for interoperability. The MINERVA design includes the image processing, model definition and data analysis modules with a central module to coordinate communication and data transfer. Dose calculation is performed by source and transport plugin modules, which communicate either directly through the database or through MINERVA's openly published, extensible markup language (XML)-based application programmer's interface (API). All internal data are managed by a database management system and can be exported to other applications or new installations through the API data formats. A full computation path has been established for molecular-targeted radiotherapy treatment planning, with additional treatment modalities presently under development.