Liquid Xenon detector for 10ps time of flight positron emission tomography

用于 10ps 飞行时间正电子发射断层扫描的液氙探测器

• 批准号: RGPIN-2020-05789
• 负责人: Tétrault, MarcAndré
• 金额: $ 2.4万
• 依托单位: Université de Sherbrooke
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2020-01-01 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=717308
• 关键词: Liquid; Xenon; detector; 10ps; time

Doctors rely heavily on medical imaging to assist them in the detection of various diseases in patients. Specifically, nuclear molecular imaging techniques such as positron emission tomography (PET) let us follow radioactive molecules that are injected in patients. These molecules interact or not with the body's chemistry. This, for example, allows oncologists to give an early diagnostic of cancer, before the tumour can be seen by other methods, as well as see if a cancer therapy is successful or not. PET imaging is also used to investigate new treatment plans or study misunderstood diseases, like Alzheimer's disease, both in humans and in small animal models of these diseases. The accuracy of the exam depends on the expert's training, but also on the quality of the images in terms of resolution (how small can we see) and contrast (sharp difference between dark and bright areas). The technology of current PET scanners has reached the limit in terms of resolution, so research to boost image quality has turned towards improving the contrast. This can be done through a complementary measurement mode named time-of-flight (ToF). In this mode, the detection of the radioactive molecule, mentioned above, becomes much more accurate, and this accuracy translates into a better contrast as there is less guesswork' involved during the generation of the image. My research program's overall goal is to design, build and test a PET detector system that will measure ToF with 10 picosecond accuracy, which corresponds to 10 millionth of one millionth of a second. With radiation moving at the speed of light, this corresponds to a 1.5 mm spatial accuracy. For comparison, the best commercial clinical scanners have a TOF accuracy of about 400 picosecond, or 6 cm. A massively multidisciplinary goal, my research program leverages recent innovations achieved at Université de Sherbrooke in ultra-fast sensor electronics. To achieve the 10 picosecond detector, my program will contribute to 1) experimentally confirm that liquid xenon, a very fast detection material but seldom used in PET, can reach the 10 picosecond goal or not; 2) develop electronics that can handle networks of these new sensors and process their gigabits per second of generated data on the fly, otherwise unmanageable in the clinic 3) investigate the compatibility of emerging low-cost sensors with PET for eventual commercialization of the scanner system. The resulting detector module will enable the construction of a new generation of high contrast human PET scanners, with more than 10x improvement over the best commercial scanners in the world. This increased contrast will allow us to inject less radioactive molecules in patients when performing PET scans, hence opening PET imaging to pediatric, natal and neonatal imaging. Lastly, my cutting-edge program will consolidate Canada's position as world leader in state-of-the-art PET scanner design.

医生在很大程度上依赖于医学成像来帮助他们检测患者的各种疾病。具体来说，核分子成像技术，如正电子发射断层扫描（PET），让我们跟踪放射性分子注射到病人。这些分子与身体的化学物质相互作用或不相互作用。例如，这允许肿瘤学家在肿瘤可以通过其他方法看到之前对癌症进行早期诊断，以及查看癌症治疗是否成功。PET成像还用于研究新的治疗计划或研究被误解的疾病，如阿尔茨海默病，无论是在人类还是在这些疾病的小动物模型中。 检查的准确性取决于专家的培训，但也取决于图像的分辨率（我们能看到多小）和对比度（暗区和亮区之间的明显差异）。当前PET扫描仪的技术在分辨率方面已经达到了极限，因此提高图像质量的研究已经转向提高对比度。这可以通过称为飞行时间（ToF）的补充测量模式来完成。在这种模式下，上述放射性分子的检测变得更加准确，并且这种准确性转化为更好的对比度，因为在图像生成期间涉及的猜测更少。 我的研究计划的总体目标是设计，建造和测试一个PET探测器系统，该系统将以10皮秒的精度测量ToF，相当于百万分之一秒的百万分之一。在辐射以光速移动的情况下，这对应于1.5 mm的空间精度。相比之下，最好的商业临床扫描仪的TOF精度约为400皮秒或6厘米。一个大规模的多学科的目标，我的研究计划利用最近在舍布鲁克大学在超快传感器电子学实现的创新。为了实现10皮秒探测器，本课题将致力于：1）实验验证PET中很少使用的快速探测材料液态氙是否能达到10皮秒的目标; 2）开发能够处理这些新传感器网络的电子设备，并在运行中每秒处理其生成的数据，3）研究新兴的低成本传感器与PET的兼容性，以最终实现扫描仪系统的商业化。 由此产生的探测器模块将能够构建新一代高对比度人体PET扫描仪，比世界上最好的商业扫描仪提高10倍以上。这种增强的对比度将使我们在进行PET扫描时能够在患者体内注入更少的放射性分子，从而将PET成像开放给儿科，纳塔尔和新生儿成像。最后，我的尖端计划将巩固加拿大在最先进的PET扫描仪设计方面的世界领先地位。