RADIATION MONITORING DEVICES, INC. — Department of Health and Human Services SBIR Phase I: DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Positron Emission Tomography (PET) is a functional im
RADIATION MONITORING DEVICES, INC. — SBIR Phase I award from Department of Health and Human Services.
- Amount
- $160,688
- Agency
- Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health
- Program / Phase
- SBIR · Phase I
- Solicitation
- PA13-234
- NAICS
- —
- Place of performance
- MA
- Period
- —
Description
DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Positron Emission Tomography (PET) is a functional imaging technique with the potential to quantify the rates of biological processes in vivo. PET imaging can provide diagnosis for symptoms of diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer's disease, head trauma, and stroke. However, to allow exploitation of the full potential of PET, there is urgent need for both improvement in the performance of PET systems and reduction in their cost. Both of these factors are strongly influencedby the available detector technology. Scintillation crystals are currently used as detectors in PET. Requirements for the scintillation crystals used in PET include fast response, high sensitivity, high light output, high energy and timing resolution, andlow cost. At present, most PET systems use crystals of Lu2SiO5:Ce (LSO) or its derivative LYSO, which satisfy most of the requirements listed above. Nevertheless, issues remain with the cost and availability of lutetium that must be considered with r