← Research Software
Detector Simulation
GEANT4 v11.x
Geometry and Tracking
GEANT4 is the gold standard for simulating how particles travel through and interact with matter. Originally developed at CERN for detector design, it is now used across HEP, nuclear physics, medical physics, and space radiation studies. GEANT4 tracks individual particles step-by-step through arbitrary detector geometries using validated physics models spanning femtoelectronvolt to petaelectronvolt energies.
GEANT4 is distributed as C++ source code. Download from the official site, then configure with CMake and compile for your platform. Binaries are not distributed — compilation is required.
Key Features
Electromagnetic Physics
Highly validated models for photon, electron, and hadron electromagnetic interactions across all energy ranges.
Hadronic Physics
Multiple interchangeable hadronic physics lists (QGSP_BERT, FTFP_BERT, etc.) validated against experimental data.
Optical Photons
Full simulation of scintillation, Cherenkov radiation, and optical transport through detector media.
Geometry (CADMesh)
Build arbitrary detector geometries using CSG primitives, Boolean operations, or imported CAD files.
Scoring Meshes
Flexible scoring and scoring meshes for dose maps, fluence tallies, and custom sensitive detectors.
Multithreading
Native multi-threaded execution with thread-local event processing for modern multi-core systems.
What It's Used For
- Designing and optimizing particle physics detectors
- Simulating radiation dose in medical physics and hadron therapy
- Modeling cosmic ray interactions in spacecraft and satellites
- Nuclear shielding calculations
- Validation of detector Monte Carlo against test beam data