This PDF file contains the front matter associated with SPIE Proceedings Volume 9214, including the Title Page, Copyright information, Table of Contents, and Conference Committee listing.

To develop a dual-energy X-ray CT (DE-CT) system, we have performed investigation of high-speed dual-energy photon counting using two comparators and a low-dark-counting LSO-MPPC (multipixel photon counter) detector. To measure X-ray spectra, electric charges produced in the MPPC are converted into voltages and amplified by a highspeed current-voltage amplifier, and the event pulses are sent to a multichannel analyzer. The MPPC was driven under pre-Geiger mode at an MPPC bias voltage of 70.7 V. The event pulses are sent to two high-speed comparators for selecting two threshold energies to perform DE-CT. The ED-CT is accomplished by repeated linear scans and rotations of the object, and two sets of projection curves of the object are obtained simultaneously by the linear scan. In the DECT, two different-energy tomograms are obtained simultaneously, and photon-count energy subtraction imaging was carried out.

While clinical applications of cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) have expanded, current CBCT technology has limitations due to the streak artifacts caused by metallic objects. The aim of this work was to develop an efficient and accurate metal data interpolation in sinogram domain to achieve artifact suppression and to improve CT image quality. In this study, we propose three interpolation methods for the metal projection data. Metal objects are segmented in raw data and replacement of the segmented regions by new values is done using three interpolation schemes, (1) replacing the raw data by the simple threshold value (thresholding method), (2) reducing the raw data to half of the value which is over threshold value (modification method), (3) using the inpainting interpolation (inpainting method). Our references are the CBCT images of the phantoms without the metal implants. The performance was evaluated by comparing the differences of root mean square error (RMSE) before and after metal artifact reduction (MAR). All the metal artifacts were reduced effectively. Metal artifacts reduction using method (1) performs the best, which improve the differences of RMSE more than 60%. This study indicates that metal artifacts can be reduced effectively by manipulating metal projection data.

To develop a dual-energy X-ray CT (DE-CT) system, we have performed investigation of high-speed dual-energy photon counting using two comparators and a low-dark-counting LSO-MPPC (multipixel photon counter) detector. To measure X-ray spectra, electric charges produced in the MPPC are converted into voltages and amplified by a highspeed current-voltage amplifier, and the event pulses are sent to a multichannel analyzer. The MPPC was driven under pre-Geiger mode at an MPPC bias voltage of 70.7 V. The event pulses are sent to two high-speed comparators for selecting two threshold energies to perform DE-CT. The ED-CT is accomplished by repeated linear scans and rotations of the object, and two sets of projection curves of the object are obtained simultaneously by the linear scan. In the DECT, two different-energy tomograms are obtained simultaneously, and photon-count energy subtraction imaging was carried out.

AdaptiSPECT is a pre-clinical pinhole SPECT imaging system under final construction at the Center for Gamma- Ray Imaging. The system is designed to be able to autonomously change its imaging configuration. The system comprises 16 detectors mounted on translational stages to move radially away and towards the center of the field- of-view. The system also possesses an adaptive pinhole aperture with multiple collimator diameters and pinhole sizes, as well as the possibility to switch between multiplexed and non-multiplexed imaging configurations. In this paper, we describe the fabrication of the AdaptiSPECT pinhole aperture and its controllers.

A review is presented of some recent work in the field of inorganic scintillator research for medical imaging applications, in particular scintillation detectors for Single-Photon Emission Computed Tomography (SPECT) and Positron Emission Tomography (PET).

An orthotopic mouse mammary window chamber (MWC) model has been developed for multimodal in-vivo functional and anatomical imaging of breast cancer xenografts. Capabilities to image numerous physiological aspects of the same tumor microenvironment over time has important applications such as in experiments studying the efficacies of therapeutic interventions, improvement of cancer detection and investigating basic cancer biology. The compatibility of this MWC model with optical, nuclear and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) makes it possible to perform a multitude of studies ranging from cellular imaging to whole body imaging. Thus, the MWC represents a powerful tool for breast cancer research. Here, two imaging applications are highlighted, namely the nuclear imaging of glycolytic metabolism with 18FFDG and MRI of tissue perfusion. Nuclear imaging is performed with the use of a 3μm thin phosphor scintillator placed directly in contact with the tissue and visible light from the scintillation is directly detected in a low noise, light tight imaging system. Tissue perfusion is imaged either qualitatively with a dynamic contrast enhancement (DCE) MRI technique or quantitatively with an arterial spin labeling flow-sensitive alternating inversion recovery-rapid acquisition with relaxation enhancement (FAIR-RARE) technique.

A 1650 μm thick columnar CsI(Tl) scintillator for upgrading iQID detectors, which is a high-resolution photon-counting gamma-ray and x-ray detector recently developed at the Center for Gamma-Ray Imaging (CGRI), has been studied in terms of sensitivity, spatial resolution and depth-of-interaction effects. To facilitate these studies, a new frame-parsing algorithm for processing raw event data is also proposed that has more degrees of freedom in data processing and can discriminate against a special kind of noise present in some low-cost intensifiers. The results show that in comparison with a 450 μm-thickness columnar CsI(Tl) scintillator, the 1650 μm thick CsI(Tl) scintillator provides more than twice the sensitivity at the expense of some spatial resolution degradation. The depth-of-interaction study also shows that event size and amplitude vary with scintillator thickness, which can assist in future detector simulations and 3D-interactionposition estimation.

Preclinical single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) is an essential tool for studying the pro-gression, response to treatment, and physiological changes in small animal models of human disease. The wide range of imaging applications is often limited by the static design of many preclinical SPECT systems. We have developed a prototype imaging system that replaces the standard static pinhole aperture with two sets of movable, keel-edged copper-tungsten blades configured as crossed (skewed) slits. These apertures can be positioned independently between the object and detector, producing a continuum of imaging configurations in which the axial and transaxial magnifications are not constrained to be equal. We incorporated a megapixel silicon double-sided strip detector to permit ultrahigh-resolution imaging. We describe the configuration of the adjustable slit aperture imaging system and discuss its application toward adaptive imaging, and reconstruction techniques using an accurate imaging forward model, a novel geometric calibration technique, and a GPU-based ultra-high-resolution reconstruction code.

In health care applications, we obtain, manage, store and communicate using high quality, large volume of image data through integrated devices. In this paper we propose several promising methods that can assist physicians in image data process and communication. We design a new semi-automated segmentation approach for radiological images, such as CT and MRI to clearly identify the areas of interest. This approach combines the advantages from both the region-based method and boundary-based methods. It has three key steps compose: coarse segmentation by using fuzzy affinity and homogeneity operator, image division and reclassification using the Voronoi Diagram, and refining boundary lines using the level set model.

We have developed a GPU-accelerated SPECT system simulator that integrates into instrument-design work flow [1]. This simulator includes a gamma-ray tracing module that can rapidly propagate gamma-ray photons through arbitrary apertures modeled by SolidWorks^TM-created stereolithography (.STL) representations with a full com- plement of physics cross sections [2, 3]. This software also contains a scintillation detector simulation module that can model a scintillation detector with arbitrary scintillation crystal shape and light-sensor arrangement. The gamma-ray tracing module enables us to efficiently model aperture and detector crystals in SolidWorks^TM and save them as STL file format, then load the STL-format model into this module to generate list-mode results of interacted gamma-ray photon information (interaction positions and energies) inside the detector crystals. The Monte-Carlo scintillation detector simulation module enables us to simulate how scintillation photons get reflected, refracted and absorbed inside a scintillation detector, which contributes to more accurate simulation of a SPECT system.