Accelerator Beam Centerlines (ABC) and High Energy Sources (HES) Produced at Varex Imaging Corporation

Salt Lake City (Utah) based Varex Imaging Corporation (VREX, NASDAQ), the former imaging components division of Varian Medical Systems, Inc. was spun-off into an independent public company in January 2017. Since the spin-off, Varex has designed, produced, and tested several Accelerator Beam Centerline (ABC) prototypes to meet or exceed the parameters of those previously developed, and some Varex ABC models have been released to production.

The primary objective set by Varex was to independently develop Varex’s own linear accelerator (Linac) technology that would be a step ahead of current technologies and form the basis of future high energy applications roadmap for Varex; namely, build 3 MeV, 6 MeV, and 9 MeV basic models, in the first place, and eventually, develop advanced products to strengthen Varex’s leadership in the field. The fundamental objective has been accomplished and our pilot ABC production line produced 20, 65, and finally, more than twice that much, exceeding 100 units, in consecutive fiscal years of 2022, 2023, and 2024, correspondingly.

Our LINAC high-power testing was performed only at our Las Vegas facility, but recently, a test cell at our production facility in Salt Lake City was built in May 2024. A LINAC utilizing 6 MeV ABC represents bulk of Varex units shipped in 2024, the LINAC has been fully tested and released to production in a Diode Electron Gun (DEG) and a Triode Electron Gun (TEG) based versions. A LINAC system Mi6SSM-T is designed based on Mi6SSM product, utilizing TEG and TEG High Voltage (HV) Driver (TEGD). Over 100 new LINAC Systems based on our new ABCs have been shipped to Varex customers. The TEGD is composed in a 19” Mi6SSM rack-mounted assembly, but it can be installed in the LINAC X-ray or Electron Beam Head for designs based on the “legacy” LINATRON® models. In addition, we are developing new linac models.

We have designed and tested MicroBeam LINATRON^TM with ABC-6-S-M-X-T-SUBMM, delivering less than 500 μm spot size (estimated 350±150 μm) and only 12.5% maximum dose rate reduction (700 R/min@1m), compared to a standard ABC-6-S-M-X-T (800 R/min@1m). We have bench-tested a new upgraded M9V accelerator, operating at 9 MeV and delivering substantially higher dose rate (maximum over 5000 R/min@1m) of another contemporary M9 (rated at 3000 R/min@1m). Our new K15V, or V15 (under development) is designed to operate at our common frequency 2998 MHz, and it utilizes a patented hybrid standing and traveling wave design. The first 9 MeV section can be a separate machine (V9), that will deliver very high dose rates, while drastically reducing the produced neutron yields, compared to K-15.

The full paper can be found in the American Journal of Modern Physics and downloaded at the Science Publishing Group website.