Analytical calculation of the lower bound on timing resolution for PET scintillation detectors comprising high-aspect-ratio crystal elements.
TLDR
This approach enables the statistical limit on timing resolution performance to be analytically expressed for clinically-relevant PET scintillation detectors without requiring Monte Carlo simulation-generated photon transport time distributions.Abstract:
Excellent timing resolution is required to enhance the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) gain available from the incorporation of time-of-flight (ToF) information in image reconstruction for positron emission tomography (PET). As the detector's timing resolution improves, so does SNR, reconstructed image quality, and accuracy. This directly impacts the challenging detection and quantification tasks in the clinic. The recognition of these benefits has spurred efforts within the molecular imaging community to determine to what extent the timing resolution of scintillation detectors can be improved and develop near-term solutions for advancing ToF-PET. Presented in this work, is a method for calculating the Cramer-Rao lower bound (CRLB) on timing resolution for scintillation detectors with long crystal elements, where the influence of the variation in optical path length of scintillation light on achievable timing resolution is non-negligible. The presented formalism incorporates an accurate, analytical probability density function (PDF) of optical transit time within the crystal to obtain a purely mathematical expression of the CRLB with high-aspect-ratio (HAR) scintillation detectors. This approach enables the statistical limit on timing resolution performance to be analytically expressed for clinically-relevant PET scintillation detectors without requiring Monte Carlo simulation-generated photon transport time distributions. The analytically calculated optical transport PDF was compared with detailed light transport simulations, and excellent agreement was found between the two. The coincidence timing resolution (CTR) between two 3 × 3 × 20 mm(3) LYSO:Ce crystals coupled to analogue SiPMs was experimentally measured to be 162 ± 1 ps FWHM, approaching the analytically calculated lower bound within 6.5%.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
Understanding and simulating SiPMs
Fabio Acerbi,Stefan Gundacker +1 more
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors consider the structure and electrical model of a single photon avalanche diode (SPAD), and the integration in an array, i.e., the SiPM.
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Measurement of intrinsic rise times for various L(Y)SO and LuAG scintillators with a general study of prompt photons to achieve 10 ps in TOF-PET.
TL;DR: The timing benefits of prompt photons at the beginning of the scintillation process (Cherenkov etc) are further studied, which leads to the conclusion that theScintillation rise time, SPTR and PTS have to be lowered simultaneously to fully profit from these fast photons in order to improve the CTR significantly.
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The silicon-photomultiplier: fundamentals and applications of a modern solid-state photon detector
Stefan Gundacker,A. Heering +1 more
TL;DR: These analyses consider the structure and the electrical model of a single photon avalanche diode (SPAD) and the integration in an array of SPADs, i.e. the SiPM, to draw solid conclusions on how best performances can be achieved for the various needs of the different applications.
Journal ArticleDOI
Advances in coincidence time resolution for PET
Joshua W. Cates,Craig S. Levin +1 more
TL;DR: This work investigates the achievable CTR with LGSO:Ce (0.025 mol%) when coupled to new silicon photomultipliers, as it has similar light output and equivalent stopping power for 511 keV annihilation photons compared to industry standard LSO: ce and LYSO:ce, and the decay time is improved by more than 30% with proper Ce concentration.
Journal ArticleDOI
Improved single photon time resolution for analog SiPMs with front end readout that reduces influence of electronic noise.
Joshua W. Cates,Stefan Gundacker,Stefan Gundacker,Etiennette Auffray,Paul Lecoq,Craig S. Levin +5 more
TL;DR: Additional factors affecting the achievable SPTR for large area, analog SiPMs when the contribution of electronic noise is minimized are explored and potential areas of improvement are pinpointed to further reduce the SPTR of large area sensors towards that achievable for a single SPAD.
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Suleman Surti,Austin Kuhn,Matthew E. Werner,Amy E. Perkins,Jeffrey A. Kolthammer,Joel S. Karp +5 more
TL;DR: The Gemini TF whole-body scanner represents the first commercially available fully 3-dimensional PET scanner that achieves time-of-flight capability as well as conventional imaging capabilities.
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Bjoern Jakoby,Bjoern Jakoby,Bjoern Jakoby,Y. Bercier,Maurizio Conti,Michael E. Casey,Bernard Bendriem,David W. Townsend,David W. Townsend +8 more
TL;DR: The physical and clinical PET performance of the first Biograph mCT TOF PET/CT scanner (Siemens Medical Solutions USA, Inc.) in comparison with its predecessor, the Biograph TruePoint TrueV, is characterized and improvements with TOF are defined.