Solid-State Photosensor for PET

描述（由申请人提供）：正电子发射断层扫描（PET）是一种功能成像技术，具有量化体内生物过程速率的潜力。碳、氮、氧，特别是氟的短寿命正电子发射同位素的可用性，使得几乎任何生物感兴趣的化合物都可以被标记为微量，并被引入人体，用PET成像。示踪剂的分布是动态成像的，允许使用适当的数学模型计算生物过程的速率。PET成像可以为阿尔茨海默病、头部创伤和中风等疾病的症状提供诊断。PET技术在现代癌症研究、临床诊断和肿瘤学中也发挥着越来越突出和明显的作用。虽然PET是一种强大的成像工具，但目前临床PET系统的性能受到现有探测器技术的限制，因此迫切需要改进PET仪器，以充分利用这一有前途的技术的潜力。提出的努力目标是设计，构建和实现新的固体光电探测器，用于读取PET成像中的闪烁晶体。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Positron Emission Tomography (PET) is a functional imaging technique with potential to quantify the rates of biological processes in vivo. The availability of short lived positron-emitting isotopes of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen and especially fluorine allows virtually any compound of biological interest to be labeled in trace amounts and introduced into the body for imaging with PET. The distribution of the tracer is imaged dynamically, allowing the rates of biological processes to be calculated using appropriate mathematical models. PET imaging can provide diagnosis for symptoms of diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, head trauma, and stroke. PET technology is also playing a prominent and an increasingly visible role in modern cancer research, clinical diagnosis and oncology. While PET is a powerful imaging tool, the performance of current clinical PET systems is limited by the available detector technology and there is an urgent need for improvement in PET instrumentation in order to exploit the full potential of this promising technique. The goal of the proposed effort is to design, build and implement new, solid-state photodetectors for reading out scintillation crystals in PET imaging.