ProTom International Inc. said Monday it began installing its newer, smaller-footprint synchrotron at a proton therapy center under construction in Michigan.

The Flower Mound, Texas-based firm said the Radiance 330 arrived last month on a commercial airplane from Boston, and teams are now installing it at the McLaren Proton Therapy Center. The proton therapy center, Michigan's first, is being built by the nine-hospital McLaren Health System on the Flint campus of the 458-bed McLaren Regional Medical Center and the Great Lakes Cancer Institute.

Construction on the three-room, 35,000 square-foot center began in October 2010, and ProTom said it was on track to treat its first patient by the end of next year.

Costs for building the center are estimated at $65 million, less than one-third of the original $168 million price tag when McLaren first announced the project. ProTom credits much of the savings to the design of the particle accelerator, which requires less shielding and is many times lighter than most of the 200-plus-ton accelerators, called cyclotrons, many other centers use.

"The scaled-down facility and equipment costs of the Radiance 330 system constitute a financially viable project which is easier to implement, paving the way for community-based proton therapy," Stephen L. Spotts, ProTom's CEO, said in a statement.

News of the installation comes only a week after ProTom announced it reached a deal with the British firm Advanced Proton Solutions Holdings Limited. Under the deal, ProTom will install a synchrotron in an in-development proton therapy center in London.

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