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FEATURED STORIES - JANUARY 2018

Construction and First Tests of an in-beam PET Demonstrator Dedicated to the Ballistic Control of Hadrontherapy Treatments With 65 MeV Protons

by S. Binet, A. Bongrand, E. Busato, P. Force, C. Guicheney, C. Insa, D. Lambert, M. Magne, F. Martin, H. Perrin, F. Podlyski, A. Rozes, and G. Montarou
article 1 photo
The construction and first proton beam tests of a demonstrator dedicated to the beam ballistic control in hadrontherapy cancer treatments are described. This cost-effective demonstrator, called large area pixelized detector, is a PET-like detector used for in-beam ballistic control. It was built to test the feasibility of monitoring in real time, during irradiation, the ion range in the patient through the measurement of the beam-induced β+ activity distribution. Achieving this goal necessitates to overcome several challenges. One of them is the rejection of the beam-induced background. Another one is the definition of fast event selection and reconstruction techniques so that real time monitoring is possible. Strategies employed to tackle these problems are presented and tested with the 65 MeV Medicyc proton beam of the cancer treatment center in Nice, France. In particular, an original fast reconstruction technique is presented. First performances obtained during irradiation of polymethyl methacrylate targets are described. more...  
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Investigation of Sub-Centimeter Lung Nodule Quantification for Low-Dose PET

by Yihuan Lu , Kathryn Fontaine, Mary Germino, Tim Mulnix, Michael E. Casey, Richard E. Carson, and Chi Liu
article 2 photo
With the recent development of high resolution time-of-flight (TOF) positron emission tomography (PET) and resolution recovery incorporated in the reconstruction algorithm, accurate detection, and quantification of sub-centimeter nodules might become feasible. In this paper, we performed a comprehensive simulation and mini-Derenzo phantom study to explore the quantitative accuracy of sub-centimeter nodules using the Siemens Biograph mCT scanner. We simulated nodules ranging from 4 to 10 mm in diameter, with 2:1 to 8:1 contrast level, at 1% to 100% (70 million) count-level, and with realistic respiratory motion amplitudes (superior-inferior/anterior-posterior directions) of 5/3, 10/6, and 20/12 mm. Images were reconstructed using motion-compensation ordered subset expectation maximization list-mode algorithm for resolution-recovery reconstruction. We also investigated different reconstruction voxel sizes of 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 mm for both simulation and phantom studies. Reconstructions with 1.0- and 2.0-mm voxel size were upsampled to those with 0.5 mm prior to evaluation and different upsampling methods were compared. The results from simulation and phantom studies were consistent. We found that nodules sized 6 mm or greater resulted in a bias of mean standardized uptake value (SUVmean) smaller than 20%, even when the count levels dropped to 4%. SUVmean was reduced with 5/3 mm motion compared to static scans by 18 ± 4% with the 100% count-level, with smaller additional reductions found for larger motion amplitudes. Images reconstructed with voxel sizes of 1.0 and 0.5 mm resulted in more accurate quantification and reduced distortion compared to those with 2-mm voxels. The results indicated that it is feasible to achieve accurate quantification for nodules ≥ 6 mm using low-dose PET, with respiratory motion correction and fine reconstruction voxel size. more...  
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Development of an Ultra High Resolution PET Scanner for Imaging Rodent Paws: PawPET

by Felipe Godinez, Kuang Gong, Jian Zhou, Martin S. Judenhofer, Abhijit J. Chaudhari, and Ramsey D. Badawi
image for article 3
A positron emission tomography (PET) scanner with submillimeter spatial resolution, capable of in vivo imaging of murine extremities was built based on two dual ended readout, hybrid depth of interaction (DOI) PET detectors. Each was composed of a 36 ×36 array of 0.43 mm ×0.43 mm ×8 mm unpolished lutetium oxyorthosilicate crystals separated by a 50 μm white diffuse reflector. The array was coupled to a position-sensing photomultiplier tube at one end and to an avalanche photodiode at the other end. The detector characterization included crystal identification accuracy, DOI, energy, and timing resolution measurements. The scanner was characterized in terms of its spatial resolution and its sensitivity and mouse images were acquired of a mouse paw injected with 18-F-NaF. Out of the 36 ×36 crystals only 33 ×33 crystals were identified. The coincidence timing, DOI, and energy resolution of the scanner was measured to be 2.8 ns, 1.4 mm, and 27%, respectively. The scanner’s spatial resolution was measured with a line source and determined from an ordered subsets expectation maximization reconstruction to be 0.56 mm. The sensitivity of the scanner was measured to be 0.6% at the center of the field of view. more...  
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Maximum-Likelihood Estimation of Scintillation Pulse Timing

by Maria Ruiz-Gonzalez, Vaibhav Bora, and Lars R. Furenlid
image for article 4
Including time-of-flight information in positron emission tomography reconstruction increases the signal-to-noise ratio if the timing information is sufficiently accurate. We estimate timing information by analyzing sampled waveforms, where the sampling frequency and number of samples acquired affect the accuracy of timing estimation. An efficient data-acquisition system acquires the minimum number of samples that contains the most timing information for a desired resolution. We describe a maximum-likelihood (ML) estimation algorithm to assign a time stamp to digital pulses. The method is based on a contracting-grid search algorithm that can be implemented in a field-programmable gate array and in graphics processing units. The Fisher-information (FI) matrix quantifies the amount of timing information that can be extracted from the waveforms. FI analyses on different segments of the waveform allow us to determine the smallest amount of data that we need to acquire in order to obtain a desired timing resolution. We describe the model and the procedure used to simulate waveforms for ML estimation and FI analysis, the ML-estimation algorithm and the timing resolution obtained from experimental data using a LaBr3:Ce crystal and two photomultiplier tubes. The results show that for lengthening segments of the pulse, timing resolution approaches a limit. We explored the method as a function of sampling frequency and compared the results to other digital time pickoff methods. This information will be used to build an efficient data-acquisition system with reduced complexity and cost that nonetheless preserves full timing performance. more...  
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A PUBLICATION OF THE IEEE NUCLEAR AND PLASMA SCIENCES SOCIETY

JANUARY 2018  |  VOLUME 2  |  NUMBER 1  |  ITRPFI  |  (SSN 2469-7311)

SCINTILLATORS AND DETECTORS
Maximum-Likelihood Estimation of Scintillation Pulse Timing . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . Ruiz-Gonzalez, V. Bora, and L. R. Furenlid

CAMERA DESIGN AND IMAGING PERFORMANCE
Development of an Ultra High Resolution PET Scanner for Imaging Rodent Paws: PawPET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . F. Godinez, K. Gong, J. Zhou, M. S. Judenhofer, A. J. Chaudhari, and R. D. Badawi

IMAGE RECONSTRUCTION AND DATA PROCESSING
GPU-Accelerated Dynamic Wavelet Thresholding Algorithm for X-Ray CT Metal Artifact Reduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
     . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .C. Peng, B. Qiu, M. Li, Y. Yang, C. Zhang, L. Gong, and J. Zheng
Estimation of the Initial Image’s Contributions to the Iterative Landweber Reconstruction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . G. L. Zeng
Prognostic Value of Head and Neck Tumor Proliferative Sphericity From 3’-Deoxy-3’-[18F] Fluorothymidine Positron Emission
     Tomography
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . M. Majdoub, B. A. W. Hoeben,   E. G. C. Troost,   W. J. G. Oyen,   J. H. A. M. Kaanders,  C. Cheze Le Rest,  E. P. Visser,  D. Visvikis,  and  M. Hatt
Investigation of Sub-Centimeter Lung Nodule Quantification for Low-Dose PET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
     . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Y. Lu, K. Fontaine, M. Germino, T. Mulnix, M. E. Casey, R. E. Carson, and C. Liu

RADIATION THERAPY
Construction and First Tests of an in-beam PET Demonstrator Dedicated to the Ballistic Control of Hadrontherapy Treatments With
      65 MeV Protons
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . S. Binet, A. Bongrand,
      E. Busato,  P. Force,  C. Guicheney,  C. Insa,  D. Lambert,  M. Magne,  F. Martin,  H. Perrin,  F. Podlyski, A. Rozes, and G. Montarou

In-Beam PET Imaging in Carbon Therapy for Dose Verification . . . . . . . . . . Z. Li, Y. Fan, M. Dong, L. Tong, L. Zhao, Y. Yin, and X. Chen

PLASMA MEDICINE
Antimicrobial Effectiveness of Regular Dielectric-Barrier Discharge (DBD) and Jet DBD on the Viability of Pseudomonas aeruginosa . . .
     . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . T. T. Gupta, J. S. Matson, and H. Ayan
Bactericidal Action Mechanism of Nonthermal Plasma: Denaturation of Membrane Proteins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
     . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Y.-M. Kim, H.-S. Yun, S.-H. Eom, B.-J. Sung, S.-H. Lee, S.-M. Jeon, S.-W. Chin, and M.-S. Lee

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