Evaluation of volume imaging with the HEAD PENN-PET scanner

A volume-imaging PET scanner for brain, animal, and pediatric imaging has been designed and built to achieve high performance, specifically in sensitivity and spatial resolution. The scanner is unique in its use of a single annular crystal of NaI(Tl), which allows a 30 cm diameter patient port and an axial field-of-view of 25.6 cm with a maximum axial acceptance angle a of /spl plusmn/26/spl deg/. By using a narrow photopeak energy window, this leads to high sensitivity with relatively low scatter and randoms. Image resolution is 3.5 mm in both the transverse and axial directions. Images are reconstructed with 128 slices, and are presented for phantom and patient studies (FDG) with both the multi-slice rebinning and the 3D-reprojection algorithm.<
>