Ww. Moses et al., PERFORMANCE OF A PET DETECTOR MODULE UTILIZING AN ARRAY OF SILICON PHOTODIODES TO IDENTIFY THE CRYSTAL OF INTERACTION, IEEE transactions on nuclear science, 40(4), 1993, pp. 1036-1040
We present initial performance results for a new multi-layer PET detec
tor module consisting of an array of 3 mm square by 30 mm deep BGO cry
stals coupled on one end to a single photomultiplier, tube and on the
opposite end to an array of 3 mm square silicon photodiodes. The photo
multiplier tube provides an accurate timing pulse and energy discrimin
ation for the all the crystals in the module, while the silicon photod
iodes identify the crystal of interaction. When a. single BGO crystal
at +25-degrees-C is excited with 511 keV photons, we measure a photodi
ode signal centered at 700 electrons (e-) with noise of 375 e- fwhm. W
hen a four-crystal/photodiode module is excited with a collimated line
source of 511 keV photons, the crystal of interaction is correctly id
entified 82% of the time. The misidentification rate can be greatly re
duced and an 8 x 8 crystal/photodiode module constructed by using thic
ker depletion layer photodiodes or cooling to 0-degrees-C.