Lewellen Tom K
Division of Nuclear Medicine, University of Washington Medical Center, 222 Old Fisheries Science Center, Seattle, Washington 98195, USA.
Phys Med Biol. 2008 Sep 7;53(17):R287-317. doi: 10.1088/0031-9155/53/17/R01. Epub 2008 Aug 11.
Positron emission tomography (PET) is a tool for metabolic imaging that has been utilized since the earliest days of nuclear medicine. A key component of such imaging systems is the detector modules--an area of research and development with a long, rich history. Development of detectors for PET has often seen the migration of technologies, originally developed for high energy physics experiments, into prototype PET detectors. Of the many areas explored, some detector designs go on to be incorporated into prototype scanner systems and a few of these may go on to be seen in commercial scanners. There has been a steady, often very diverse development of prototype detectors, and the pace has accelerated with the increased use of PET in clinical studies (currently driven by PET/CT scanners) and the rapid proliferation of pre-clinical PET scanners for academic and commercial research applications. Most of these efforts are focused on scintillator-based detectors, although various alternatives continue to be considered. For example, wire chambers have been investigated many times over the years and more recently various solid-state devices have appeared in PET detector designs for very high spatial resolution applications. But even with scintillators, there have been a wide variety of designs and solutions investigated as developers search for solutions that offer very high spatial resolution, fast timing, high sensitivity and are yet cost effective. In this review, we will explore some of the recent developments in the quest for better PET detector technology.
正电子发射断层扫描（PET）是一种代谢成像工具，自核医学诞生之初就已被使用。此类成像系统的一个关键组件是探测器模块，这是一个有着悠久而丰富历史的研发领域。PET探测器的开发常常见证了原本为高能物理实验开发的技术迁移到PET探测器原型中。在众多探索的领域中，一些探测器设计被纳入原型扫描仪系统，其中一些可能会出现在商业扫描仪中。原型探测器一直在稳步发展，而且往往非常多样化，随着PET在临床研究中的使用增加（目前由PET/CT扫描仪推动）以及用于学术和商业研究应用的临床前PET扫描仪的迅速普及，发展速度加快了。这些努力大多集中在基于闪烁体的探测器上，不过各种替代方案也一直在被考虑。例如，多年来对线室进行了多次研究，最近各种固态设备出现在PET探测器设计中，用于非常高空间分辨率的应用。但即使是使用闪烁体，随着开发者寻找提供非常高空间分辨率、快速计时、高灵敏度且具有成本效益的解决方案，也研究了各种各样的设计和解决方案。在这篇综述中，我们将探讨在寻求更好的PET探测器技术方面的一些最新进展。
