New material for low-dose brachytherapy seeds: Xe-doped amorphous carbon films with post-growth neutron activated 125I.

We report a novel material for use in (125)I brachytherapy that consists of amorphous carbon films grown by ion-beam-assisted deposition and doped with Xe (5 at%) by implantation. Samples of these films grown on Si substrates were irradiated with neutrons in a TRIGA-I nuclear reactor for the production (125)Xe, and latter characterized by gamma spectroscopy. The results indicate that the (124)Xe was efficiently converted into (125)Xe, the precursor of (125)I, and support the activity calculations for a model brachytherapy seed.