New Detector Configuration for Nuclear Medicine

Positron Emission Tomography has proved to be useful in the study of psychiatric disease suchas epilepsy, neurologic disorders, brain function, cardiac metabolism, tumor detection, staging andprognosis. The PENN-PET scanner currently produced by UGM Medical Systems is designed specificallyto serve the clinical needs and features a large axial field-of-view, equal resolution in all directions anda fully 3-D reconstruction method. The proposed research will lead to improved spatial resolution,improved count rate capability and more flexibility in geometry than is currently possible. The techniquesto achieve this are equally applicable to single photon Anger cameras as currently used in NuclearMedicine and these applications will also be investigated as part of the phase II work. Furthermore anew scintillator, YA1O(3)(Ce), will be investigated as an alternative to NaI(Tl).