High sensitivity detectors for positron emission tomography

当前一代的正电子发射断层扫描(PET)扫描仪针对向受试者注入大量放射性时的高计数率性能进行了优化。在许多PET成像的新应用中，例如跟踪活体中的放射性标记细胞，所使用的放射性量非常低，导致图像非常差。在这项工作中，我们寻求在这些非常低的计数率下提高当代PET系统的性能，并开发专门为这些低计数成像任务设计的新的PET检测系统。这项研究工具和仪器拨款将资助一个数据采集系统，该系统将在我们的实验室用于评估当代PET探测器以及我们实验室设计和建造的新探测器的性能。这些改进将导致PET图像定量精度的提高，并扩大可以使用PET成像技术完成的研究类型。

The current generation of positron emission tomography (PET) scanners are optimized for performance at the high count rates seen when large amounts of radioactivity are injected into a subject.  In many new applications of PET imaging, such as tracking radio-labeled cells in vivo, the amount of radioactivity used is very low, resulting in very poor images.  In this work, we seek to improve the performance of current generation PET systems at these very low count rates and to develop new PET detection systems designed specifically for these low count imaging tasks.  This Research Tools and Instruments grant will fund a data acquisition system that will be used in our laboratory to evaluate the performance of current generation PET detectors as well as new detectors designed and constructed in our laboratory.  These improvements will lead to improvements in the quantitative accuracy of PET images and expand the type of studies that can be done using PET imaging techniques.