Britton Chance Center for Biomedical Photonics, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China MoE Key Laboratory of Biomedical Photonics, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China.
J Xray Sci Technol. 2014;22(3):285-97. doi: 10.3233/XST-140425.
The dual-modality systems combined fluorescence molecular tomography (FMT) and micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) can provide molecular and anatomical information of small animals simultaneously. Except for anatomic localization, micro-CT should also offer boundary of different organs as reconstruction priors for FMT, which is more challenging than acquisition of structural information. In this paper, we propose a framework to extract structural priors of a living mouse with micro-CT. The iodinated lipid emulsion contrast agent was adopted to enhance the contrast of the soft tissues of the mouse. Then organs in thorax and abdomen were segmented with different approaches depending on the characteristics of the organs. Bone, lung, heart, liver, spleen, and muscles were separately segmented. And the results were compared with that manually segmented. The Tanimoto coefficient and the relative volume difference of segmented slices were measured to be 91.28 ± 5.78 and 0.27 ± 3.15, respectively. In our simulation study of FMT reconstruction, the errors of measured position and concentration of the fluorophore with priors declined by 89.7% and 79.6% in thorax, as well as 80.8% and 78.3% in abdomen, respectively, compared with the results without priors. The proposed scheme will make FMT reconstruction much more reliable and practical in small animal study.
双模系统结合荧光分子断层成像（FMT）和微计算机断层扫描（micro-CT）可以同时提供小动物的分子和解剖学信息。除了解剖定位，micro-CT 还应为 FMT 提供重建先验的不同器官边界，这比获取结构信息更具挑战性。在本文中，我们提出了一种利用 micro-CT 提取活鼠结构先验的框架。采用碘化脂质乳液造影剂增强了小鼠软组织的对比度。然后，根据器官的特点，采用不同的方法对胸腔和腹腔内的器官进行分割。分别对骨骼、肺、心脏、肝脏、脾脏和肌肉进行分割。并将结果与手动分割进行比较。分割切片的 Tanimoto 系数和相对体积差异分别为 91.28 ± 5.78 和 0.27 ± 3.15。在我们对 FMT 重建的模拟研究中，与没有先验的结果相比，胸腔中荧光团的测量位置和浓度的误差分别降低了 89.7%和 79.6%，腹部分别降低了 80.8%和 78.3%。所提出的方案将使小动物研究中的 FMT 重建更加可靠和实用。
