Objective: Nanodosimetry strives to develop a novel dosimetry concept suitable for advanced modalities of cancer radiotherapy, such as proton therapy. This project aims to evaluate the plausibility of the physical models implemented in the Geant4 Very Low Energy (Geant4-DNA) extensions by comparing nanodosimetric quantities calculated with Geant4-DNA and the PTB Monte Carlo track structure code.
Methods: Nanodosimetric track structure parameters were calculated for cylindrical targets representing DNA and nucleosome segments and converted into the probability of producing a DSB using the model proposed by Garty et al. [1]. Monoenergetic protons and electrons of energies typical for δ-electron spectra were considered as primary particles.
Results: Good agreement was found between the two codes for electrons of energies above 200 eV. Below this energy Geant4-DNA produced slightly higher numbers of ionisations in the sensitive volumes and higher probabilities for DSB formation. For protons, Geant4-DNA also gave higher numbers of ionisations and DSB probabilities, particularly in the low energy range, while a satisfactory agreement was found for energies higher than 1 MeV.
Conclusions: Comparing two codes can be useful as any observed divergence in results between the two codes provides valuable information as to where further consideration of the underlying physical models used in each code may be required. Consistently it was seen that the largest difference between the codes was in the low energy ranges for each particle type.

[1] G. Garty et al., Phys. Med. Biol. 55, 761-781 (2010)