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It is well known that a PET detector capable of measuring both photon time-of-flight (TOF) and depth-of-interaction (DOI) improves the image quality and accuracy. Phoswich designs have been realized in PET detectors to measure DOI for more than a decade. However, PET detectors based on phoswich designs put great demand on the readout circuits, which have to differentiate the pulse shape produced by different crystal layers. A simple pulse shape discrimination approach is required to realize the phoswich designs in a clinical PET scanner, which consists of thousands of scintillation crystal elements. In this work, we studied time-over-threshold (ToT) as a pulse shape parameter for DOI. The energy, timing and DOI performance were evaluated for a phoswich detector design comprising mm LYSO:Ce crystal optically coupled to mm calcium co-doped LSO:Ce,Ca(0.4%) crystal read out by a silicon photomultiplier (SiPM). A DOI accuracy of 97.2% has been achieved for photopeak events using the proposed time-over-threshold (ToT) processing. The energy resolution without correction for SiPM non-linearity was % and % FWHM at 511 keV for LYSO and LSO crystal layers, respectively. The coincidence time resolution for photopeak events ranges from 164.6 ps to 183.1 ps FWHM, depending on the layer combinations. The coincidence time resolution for inter-crystal scatter events ranges from 214.6 ps to 418.3 ps FWHM, depending on the energy windows applied. These results show great promises of using ToT for pulse shape discrimination in a TOF phoswich detector since a ToT measurement can be easily implemented in readout electronics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the field of information theory, compressed sensing (CS) had been developed to recover signals at a lower sampling rate than suggested by the Nyquist–Shannon theorem, provided the signals have a sparse representation with respect to some base. CS has recently emerged as a method to multiplex PET detector readouts thanks to the sparse nature of 511 keV photon interactions in a typical PET study. We have shown in our previous numerical studies that, at the same multiplexing ratio, CS achieves higher signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) compared to Anger and cross-strip multiplexing. In addition, unlike Anger logic, multiplexing by CS preserves the capability to resolve multi-hit events, in which multiple pixels are triggered within the resolving time of the detector. In this work, we characterized the time, energy and intrinsic spatial resolution of two CS detectors and a data acquisition system we have developed for a PET insert system for simultaneous PET/MRI. The CS detector comprises a mosaic of arrays of mm3 lutetium-yttrium orthosilicate crystals coupled one-to-one to eight silicon photomultiplier arrays. The total number of 128 pixels is multiplexed down to 16 readout channels by CS. The energy, coincidence time and intrinsic spatial resolution achieved by two CS detectors were % FWHM at 511 keV, 4.5 ns FWHM and 2.3 mm FWHM, respectively. A series of experiments were conducted to measure the sources of time jitter that limit the time resolution of the current system, which provides guidance for potential system design improvements. These findings demonstrate the feasibility of compressed sensing as a promising multiplexing method for PET detectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The simultaneous acquisition of PET and MRI data shows promise to provide powerful capabilities to study disease processes in human subjects, guide the development of novel treatments, and monitor therapy response and disease progression. A brain-size PET detector ring insert for an MRI system is being developed that, if successful, can be inserted into any existing MRI system to enable simultaneous PET and MRI images of the brain to be acquired without mutual interference.The PET insert uses electro-optical coupling to relay all the signals from the PET detectors out of the MRI system using analog modulated lasers coupled to fiber optics. Because the fibers use light instead of electrical signals, the PET detector can be electrically decoupled from the MRI making it partially transmissive to the RF field of the MRI. The SiPM devices and low power lasers were powered using non-magnetic MRI compatible batteries.Also, the number of laser-fiber channels in the system was reduced using techniques adapted from the field of compressed sensing. Using the fact that incoming PET data is sparse in time and space, electronic circuits implementing constant weight codes uniquely encode the detector signals in order to reduce the number of electro-optical readout channels by 8-fold.Two out of a total of sixteen electro-optical detector modules have been built and tested with the entire RF-shielded detector gantry for the PET ring insert. The two detectors have been tested outside and inside of a 3T MRI system to study mutual interference effects and simultaneous performance with MRI. Preliminary results show that the PET insert is feasible for high resolution simultaneous PET/MRI imaging for applications in the brain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]