Speaker
Description
This project presents the simulation of a low-cost Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scanner. The high cost of PET scanners limits their use in many parts of the world, specifically developing countries. Lower-cost alternatives would increase the accessibility for neurological and paediatric care.
A detailed Monte Carlo simulation framework is used to model a full PET scan, from the decay of the radionuclides in a brain phantom, to the detector geometry and digitisation of the scintillator response, and the production of sinograms. This enables performance-cost studies of different scanner ring sizes, module arrangements, and digitizer strategies before the first physical prototype is produced.
The main challenge of low-cost systems is the degradation in data quality due to the simpler detector design. The simulated data can also be used to develop image reconstruction methods that produce clinically relevant images from this lower quality data.