Quantitative Nuclear Medicine Imaging

This book provides a review of image analysis techniques as they are applied in the field of diagnostic and therapeutic nuclear medicine. Driven in part by the remarkable sophistication of nuclear medicine instrumentation and - crease in computing power and its ready and inexpensive availability, this is a relatively new yet rapidly expanding field. Likewise, although the use of nuclear imaging for diagnosis and therapy has origins dating back almost to the pioneering work of Dr G. de Hevesy, quantitative imaging has only recently emerged as a promising approach for diagnosis and therapy of many diseases. An effort has, therefore, been made to place the reviews provided in this book in a broader context. The effort to do this is reflected by the inclusion of introductory chapters that address basic principles of nuclear medicine instrumentation and dual-modality imaging, followed by overview of issues that are closely related to quantitative nuclear imaging and its potential role in diagnostic and therapeutic applications. A brief overview of each chapter is provided below. Chapter 1 presents a general overview of nuclear medicine imaging physics and instrumentation including planar scintigraphy, single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) and positron emission tomography (PET). Nowadays, patients’ diagnosis and therapy is rarely done without the use of imaging technology. As such, imaging considerations are incorporated in almost every chapter of the book. The development of dual-modality - aging systems is an emerging research field, which is addressed in chapter 2.