Design and early testing of a new medium-energy transmission device for attenuation correction in SPECT and PET

A new concept of transmission device for SPECT and PET attenuation correction is described. The system uses a medium energy Barium source (main peak at 356 keV) in a fan beam geometry suitable for a variety of camera configurations. Advantages of Barium are numerous and seem to overcome some limitations observed in earlier generations of scanning devices. Furthermore, it is shown that with slight modifications of the acquisition electronics and imaging protocol, high quality anatomical information can also be obtained for registration purposes.