Cm. Kao et al., Accurate image reconstruction using DOI information and its implications for the development of compact PET systems, IEEE NUCL S, 47(4), 2000, pp. 1551-1560
We study the use of a computationally efficient sinogram restoration (SR) a
pproach for reconstruction of 2D PET data acquired by systems with depth-of
-interaction capability. When the effects of scatter and randoms are ignore
d, our preliminary results show that the proposed approach can yield images
of excellent resolution uniformity for a hypothetical compact system with
a field-of-view (FOV) as large as 98% of the detector-ring size. In compari
son with images generated by the conventional rebinning approach, the resol
ution uniformity across the FOV in the image produced by incorporating SR i
s improved by a factor of about 10, and the spatial resolution at the edge
of the FOV is improved by a factor of about 2.2 Moreover, the SR approach p
roduces better intensity recovery and source positioning. Integration of th
e use of DOI detectors and SR reconstruction may thus provide a new way for
developing compact PET systems. For a given FOV, such a compact system can
produce images of quality better than those obtained by a conventional sys
tem that employs a detector ring approximately 50% larger than the compact
system. The much reduced detector-ring size of the compact system can great
ly reduce production cost, improve image resolution and resolution uniformi
ty, and increase system sensitivity.