Optimized sampling for high resolution multi-pinhole brain SPECT with stationary detectors

Brain perfusion SPECT can be used in the diagnosis of various neurologic or psychiatric disorders, e.g. stroke, epilepsy, dementia and posttraumatic stress disorder. As traditional SPECT provides limited resolution and sensitivity, we recently proposed a high resolution focusing multi-pinhole clinical SPECT scanner dubbed G-SPECT-I (Beekman...

Optimized image acquisition for dopamine transporter imaging with ultra-high resolution clinical pinhole SPECT

SPECT can be used to image dopamine transporter (DaT) availability in the human striatum, e.g. for diagnosis of Parkinson's disease (PD). As traditional SPECT provides limited resolution and sensitivity, we proposed a full ring focusing multi-pinhole SPECT system (G-SPECT-I (Beekman 2015 Eur. J. Nucl. Med. Mol. Imaging 42 S209)) which...

Targeted multi-pinhole SPECT

Purpose: Small-animal single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) with focused multi-pinhole collimation geometries allows scanning modes in which large amounts of photons can be collected from specific volumes of interest. Here we present new tools that improve targeted imaging of specific organs and tumours, and validate the effects of...

Absolute quantitative total-body small-animal SPECT with focusing pinholes

Purpose: In pinhole SPECT, attenuation of the photon flux on trajectories between source and pinholes affects quantitative accuracy of reconstructed images. Previously we introduced iterative methods that compensate for image degrading effects of detector and pinhole blurring, pinhole sensitivity and scatter for multi-pinhole SPECT. The aim of...

Pixel-based subsets for rapid multi-pinhole SPECT reconstruction

Single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) and positron emission tomography (PET) visualize distributions of radioactive tracer molecules in vivo. These distributions can be calculated from projection images with iterative image reconstruction algorithms. In each iteration an update of the image is calculated after comparing a set of...

3-D Rat Brain Phantom for High-Resolution Molecular Imaging: Experimental studies aimed at advancing understanding of human brain disease and malfunction, and of behavior problems, may be aided by computer models of small laboratory animals

With the steadily improving resolution of novel small-animal single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) and positron emission tomography devices, highly detailed phantoms are required for testing and optimizing these systems. We present a three-dimensional (3-D) digital and physical phantom pair to represent, e.g., cerebral blood flow,...

Atlas-driven scan planning for high-resolution Micro-SPECT data acquisition based on multi-view photographs: A pilot study

Highly focused Micro-SPECT scanners enable the acquisition of functional small animal data with very high-resolution. To acquire a maximum of emitted photons from a specific structure of interest and at the same time minimize the required acquisition time, typically only a small subvolume of the animal is scanned that contains the organs of...

U-SPECT-II: An Ultra-High-Resolution Device for Molecular Small-Animal Imaging

We present a new rodent SPECT system (U-SPECT-II) that enables molecular imaging of murine organs down to resolutions of less than half a millimeter and high-resolution total-body imaging. Methods: The U-SPECT-II is based on a triangular stationary detector set-up, an XYZ stage that moves the animal during scanning, and interchangeable cylindric...

Atlas-driven scan planning for high-resolution micro-SPECT data acquisition based on multi-vew photographs: A pilot study

Highly focused Micro-SPECT scanners enable the acquisition of functional small animal data with very high-resolution. To acquire a maximum of emitted photons from a specific structure of interest and at the same time minimize the required acquisition time, typically only a small subvolume of the animal is scanned that contains the organs of...

High-Resolution Cardiac Rat SPECT: Effect ofDose and Acquisition Time

SPECT imaging with low dose or short acquisition time can lead to very noisy reconstructed images. With the USPECT-II system we study the effect of low-count scans, and 3D Gaussian blurring to suppress statistical errors. Three different groups of short-time cardiac rat scans were derived from a longtime scan. Images were reconstructed and then...

System Calibration and Statistical Image Reconstruction for Ultra-High Resolution Stationary Pinhole SPECT

For multipinhole single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), iterative reconstruction algorithms are preferred over analytical methods, because of the often complex multipinhole geometries and the ability of iterative algorithms to compensate for effects like spatially variant sensitivity and resolution. Ideally, such compensation...

Imaging dynamics of organs and drugs at sub-half-MM and sub-minite resolution using focusing pinhole spect

We demonstrate new technologies for SPECT imaging with unsurpassed resolution in mice and rats. Results of the imaging of living animals will be shown. In addition development of detectors for next generation systems with an even higher resolution will be shown.