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Pharmacokinetic positron emission tomography (PET) studies rely on the measurement of the arterial input function (AIF), which represents the time-activity curve of the radiotracer concentration in the blood plasma. Traditionally, obtaining the AIF requires invasive procedures, such as arterial catheterization, which can be challenging, time-consuming, and associated with potential risks. Therefore, the development of non-invasive techniques for AIF measurement is highly desirable. This study presents a detector for the non-invasive measurement of the AIF in PET studies. The detector is based on the combination of scintillation fibers and silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) which leads to a very compact and rugged device. The feasibility of the detector was assessed through Monte Carlo simulations conducted on mouse tail and human wrist anatomies studying relevant parameters such as energy spectrum, detector efficiency and minimum detectable activity (MDA). The simulations involved the use of 18F and 68Ga isotopes, which exhibit significantly different positron ranges. In addition, several prototypes were built in order to study the different components of the detector including the scintillation fiber, the coating of the fiber, the SiPMs, and the operating configuration. Finally, the simulations were compared with experimental measurements conducted using a tube filled with both 18F and 68Ga to validate the obtained results. The MDA achieved for both anatomies (approximately 1000 kBq/mL for mice and 1 kBq/mL for humans) falls below the peak radiotracer concentrations typically found in PET studies, affirming the feasibility of conducting non-invasive AIF measurements with the fiber detector. The sensitivity for measurements with a tube filled with 18F (68Ga) was 1.2 (2.07) cps/(kBq/mL), while for simulations, it was 2.81 (6.23) cps/(kBq/mL). Further studies are needed to validate these results in pharmacokinetic PET studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: A multilayer scintillation-fiber detector has been developed for precision measurement of time-dependent dose verification in proton therapy. In order to achieve the time and position sensitivity required for the precision dose measurements, a prototype detector was constructed with double-clad 1-mm-thick scintillation fibers and 128-channel silicon photodiodes. The hole charges induced in each channel of the silicon photodiodes were amplified and processed with a charge-integration mode. The detector was tested with 45-MeV proton beams provided by the MC50 cyclotron at the Korea Institute of Radiological and Medical Science (KIRAMS). The detector response for a 45-MeV proton beam was agreed fairly well with the predicted by GEANT4 simulations. Furthermore, the quantitative accuracy appearing in the spatial distribution of the detector response measured for 20s is in the order of 1%, whose accuracy is satisfactory to verify beam-induced dose in proton therapy. We anticipate that the detector composed of scintillation fibers and operating in the charge-integration mode allows us to perform quality measurement of dynamic therapeutic beams. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]