Development of High-Resolution Pet Mammogram Modules.
Abstract
Early detection of breast cancer is critical to successful treatment. Unfortunately, conventional x-ray mammography has severe limitations in early tumor detection, in particular for women with radiographically dense breasts. For this reason, nuclear medicine techniques are beginning to be applied to diagnostic breast imaging. Among nuclear medicine techniques, Positron Emission Tomography (PET) has the greatest potential for high sensitivity to small tumors, and good uptake ratios have been demonstrated for breast tumors with the PET radiotracer Fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG). The key PET detector attributes for this application are high acceptance and good efficiency at high rates, fine spatial resolution, and good scatter rejection. We have constructed and tested novel prototype PET detector modules which produce very high-resolution images in all three dimensions, with large acceptance and high rate capability. Our devices exhibited performance in generally good agreement with our expectations, and obtained an intrinsic spatial resolution of better than 3mm FWHM. We also developed 3-D iterative image reconstruction techniques which have broad application to tomographic breast imaging in nuclear medicine, and for other purpose.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Aug 01, 1998
- Accession Number
- ADA366507
Entities
People
- William Worstell
Organizations
- Boston University