High-performance and cost-effective detector modules based on ultra-dense and fast ceramic scintillator for long axial field-of-view positron emission tomography

总结 正电子发射断层扫描（PET）作为一种高度特异性和灵敏度的断层成像手段， 成像的分子相互作用和途径在人类中，提供了巨大的效用转化医学。 最近，长轴向视场PET扫描仪，其提供优异的几何覆盖，给出更好的成像质量。 检测灵敏度，已开发。然而，成本和性能问题引起了关注。到 解决成本和性能问题，下一代长轴向视野PET探测器模块应 采用新的结晶器，以可行的价格实现PET的全部性能。 一种提议的陶瓷闪烁体具有极高的阻止能力和密度，优于目前使用的任何闪烁体。 用于PET的闪烁体。所提出的闪烁体具有高的光产额和优异的能量分辨率。此外，委员会认为， 我们实现了非常好的符合定时分辨率。此外，它具有立方晶体结构， 通过陶瓷加工制造，与L（Y）SO相比，具有成本大幅降低的潜力。 该建议是：1）开发大容量和高清晰度的PET用新型陶瓷闪烁体，2） 将所述新闪烁体表征为PET闪烁体，3）将所述新闪烁体阵列块应用到井中， 设计现有PET探测器模块，以评估模块级新闪烁体的性能，以及 最后4）通过结合新的陶瓷闪烁体来开发新的飞行时间（TOF）-PET探测器模块 以及用于下一代PET扫描仪的先进PET读出方法。 所提出的陶瓷闪烁体和PET探测器模块不限于长轴向视场PET 扫描仪，并将广泛使用。这一提议的影响是，它提供了一条途径，1）实现长期 具有前所未有的灵敏度的轴向视场扫描仪，而不会成比例地增加扫描仪成本， 2)在降低DOI效应和改善定时方面， 和能量分辨率，而不会损失下一代TOF-PET扫描仪的检测效率。

SUMMARY Positron emission tomography (PET) is unrivaled as a highly specific and sensitive means for tomographic imaging of molecular interactions and pathways in humans, offering great utility for translational medicine. Recently, long axial field-of-view PET scanners, which provide excellent geometric coverage, giving much better detection sensitivity, have been developed. However, cost and performance issues are raised as concerns. To resolve both cost and performance issues, next generation long axial field-of-view PET detector modules should employ new scintillators to realize the full performance capabilities of PET at a viable price point. A proposed ceramic scintillator has extremely high stopping power and density, better than any currently used scintillator for PET. The proposed scintillator has a high light yield and an excellent energy resolution. Moreover, we achieved a very good coincidence timing resolution. In addition, it has a cubic crystal structure allowing fabrication by ceramic processing, with potential for a major reduction in cost compared with L(Y)SO. This proposal is 1) to develop the new ceramic scintillator for PET with large volumes and high clarity, 2) to characterize the new scintillator as a PET scintillator, 3) to apply the new scintillator array blocks into well- designed existing PET detector modules to evaluate performance of the new scintillator at the module level, and finally 4) to develop novel time-of-flight (TOF)-PET detector modules by combining the new ceramic scintillator and advanced PET readout methods for next-generation PET scanners. The proposed ceramic scintillator and PET detector modules are not limited to long axial field-of-view PET scanners and will be widely usable. The impact of this proposal is that it provides a pathway to 1) realizing long axial field-of-view scanners with unprecedented sensitivity without a proportional increase in scanner cost and 2) enabling performance advantages in shorter scintillators in terms of reducing DOI effect and improving timing and energy resolution without losing detection efficiency for next-generation TOF-PET scanners.