• Journal of Veterinary Clinics
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.127-132
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• 2024

A 6-month-old intact female Bichon Frise dog weighing 0.9 kg presented with vomiting, anorexia, and lethargy persisting for 3 days. No remarkable abnormalities were detected on the history or physical examination. Laboratory findings were mostly normal, except for elevated levels of alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and blood urea nitrogen (BUN). Abdominal radiography revealed a fluid-dilated stomach and gas-dilated intestinal loops in the regional areas. Abdominal ultrasonography was performed to investigate the cause of gastrointestinal dilation, which revealed a rectangular, homogeneous, echogenic foreign material with no shadowing in the small intestine, causing mechanical obstruction. Upon further inquiry involving detailed re-take of history with the owner, a history of ingesting dog gum 4 days prior was identified. On surgical enterotomy, the hard pet food was identified and removed from the distal duodenum. Postoperatively, the patient's clinical signs showed complete improvement, with a return to normal appetite. The present case demonstrates that less-digestible, hard pet food, despite showing no shadowing on ultrasonography, can act as a foreign material, causing mechanical intestinal obstruction in a small-breed puppy. Furthermore, surgical removal of these materials is necessary in cases of intestinal obstruction.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine
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• v.38 no.5
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• pp.338-343
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• 2004

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to develop a small animal PET using dual layer phoswich detector to minimize parallax error that degrades spatial resolution at the outer part of field-of-view (FOV). Materials and Methods: A simulation tool GATE (Geant4 Application for Tomographic Emission) was used to derive optimal parameters of small PET, and PET was developed employing the parameters. Lutetium Oxyorthosilicate (LSO) and Lutetium-Yttrium Aluminate-Perovskite(LuYAP) was used to construct dual layer phoswitch crystal. $8{\times}8$ arrays of LSO and LuYAP pixels, $2mm{\times}2mm{\times}8mm$ in size, were coupled to a 64-channel position sensitive photomultiplier tube. The system consisted of 16 detector modules arranged to one ring configuration (ring inner diameter 10 cm, FOV of 8 cm). The data from phoswich detector modules were fed into an ADC board in the data acquisition and preprocessing PC via sockets, decoder block, FPGA board, and bus board. These were linked to the master PC that stored the events data on hard disk. Results: In a preliminary test of the system, reconstructed images were obtained by using a pair of detectors and sensitivity and spatial resolution were measured. Spatial resolution was 2.3 mm FWHM and sensitivity was 10.9 $cps/{\mu}Ci$ at the center of FOV. Conclusion: The radioactivity distribution patterns were accurately represented in sinograms and images obtained by PET with a pair of detectors. These preliminary results indicate that it is promising to develop a high performance small animal PET.

• Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging
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• v.42 no.5
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• pp.401-409
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• 2008

Purpose: Recently multi-modal imaging system has become widely adopted in molecular imaging. We tried to fabricate animal-specific positioning molds for PET/MR fusion imaging using easily available molding clay and rapid foam. The animal-specific positioning molds provide immobilization and reproducible positioning of small animal. Herein, we have compared fiber-based molding clay with rapid foam in fabricating the molds of experimental animal. Materials and Methods: The round bottomed-acrylic frame, which fitted into microPET gantry, was prepared at first. The experimental mice was anesthetized and placed on the mold for positioning. Rapid foam and fiber-based clay were used to fabricate the mold. In case of both rapid foam and the clay, the experimental animal needs to be pushed down smoothly into the mold for positioning. However, after the mouse was removed, the fabricated clay needed to be dried completely at $60^{\circ}C$ in oven overnight for hardening. Four sealed pipet tips containing $[^{18}F]FDG$ solution were used as fiduciary markers. After injection of $[^{18}F]FDG$ via tail vein, microPET scanning was performed. Successively, MRI scanning was followed in the same animal. Results: Animal-specific positioning molds were fabricated using rapid foam and fiber-based molding clay for multimodality imaging. Functional and anatomical images were obtained with microPET and MRI, respectively. The fused PET/MR images were obtained using freely available AMIDE program. Conclusion: Animal-specific molds were successfully prepared using easily available rapid foam, molding clay and disposable pipet tips. Thanks to animal-specific molds, fusion images of PET and MR were co-registered with negligible misalignment.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.140-147
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• 2011

The purpose of this study was to estimate internal motion using molecular sieve for quantitative improvement of lung tumor and to localize lung tumor in the small animal PET image by evaluated data. Internal motion has been demonstrated in small animal lung region by molecular sieve contained radioactive substance. Molecular sieve for internal lung motion target was contained approximately 37 kBq Cu-64. The small animal PET images were obtained from Siemens Inveon scanner using external trigger system (BioVet). SD-Rat PET images were obtained at 60 min post injection of FDG 37 MBq/0.2 mL via tail vein for 20 min. Each line of response in the list-mode data was converted to sinogram gated frames (2~16 bin) by trigger signal obtained from BioVet. The sinogram data was reconstructed using OSEM 2D with 4 iterations. PET images were evaluated with count, SNR, FWHM from ROI drawn in the target region for quantitative tumor analysis. The size of molecular sieve motion target was $1.59{\times}2.50mm$. The reference motion target FWHM of vertical and horizontal was 2.91 mm and 1.43 mm, respectively. The vertical FWHM of static, 4 bin and 8 bin was 3.90 mm, 3.74 mm, and 3.16 mm, respectively. The horizontal FWHM of static, 4 bin and 8 bin was 2.21 mm, 2.06 mm, and 1.60 mm, respectively. Count of static, 4 bin, 8 bin, 12 bin and 16 bin was 4.10, 4.83, 5.59, 5.38, and 5.31, respectively. The SNR of static, 4 bin, 8 bin, 12 bin and 16 bin was 4.18, 4.05, 4.22, 3.89, and 3.58, respectively. The FWHM were improved in accordance with gate number increase. The count and SNR were not proportionately improve with gate number, but shown the highest value in specific bin number. We measured the optimal gate number what minimize the SNR loss and gain improved count when imaging lung tumor in small animal. The internal motion estimation provide localized tumor image and will be a useful method for organ motion prediction modeling without external motion monitoring system.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.343-351
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• 2001

Cerebral post-ischemic hyperperfusion has been observed at the acute and subacute periods of ischemic stroke. In the animal stroke model, early post-ischemic hyperperfusion is the mark of recanalization of the occluded artery with reperfusion. In the PET studios of both humans and experimental animals, early post-ischemic hyperperfusion is not a key factor in the development of tissue infarction and indicates the spontaneous reperfusion of the ischemic brain tissue without late infarction or with small infarction. But late post-ischemic hyperperfusion shows the worse prognosis with reperfusion injury associated with brain tissue necrosis. Early post-ischemic hyperperfusion defined by PET and SPECT may be useful in predicting the prognosis of ischemic stroke and the effect of thrombolytic therapy.

• Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging
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• v.42 no.3
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• pp.235-245
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• 2008

Purpose: The HSV1-tk gene has been extensively studied as a type of reporter gene. In hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), only a small proportion of patients are eligible for surgical resection and there is limitation in palliative options. Therefore, there is a need for the development of new treatment modalities and gene therapy is a leading candidate. In the present study, we investigated the usefulness of substrate, 2'-fluoro-2'-deoxy-1-${\beta}$-D-arabino-furanosyi-5-[$^{124/125}I$]iodo- uracil ([$I^{124/125}I$]FIAU) as a non-invasive imaging agent for HSV1-tk gene therapy in hepatoma model using small animal PET. Material and Methods: With the Morris hepatoma MCA cell line and MCA-tk cell line which was transduced with the HSV1-tk gene, in vitro uptake and correlation study between [$^{125}I$]FIAU uptake according to increasing numeric count of percentage of MCA-tk cell were performed. The biodistribution data and small animal PET images with [$^{124}I$]FIAU were obtained with Balb/c-nude mice bearing both MCA and MCA-tk tumors. Results:, Specific accumulation of [[$^{125}I$]FIAU was observed in MCA-tk cells but uptake was low in MCA cells. Uptake in MCA-tk cells was 15 times higher than that of MCA cells at 480 min. [$^{125}I$]FIAU uptake was linearly correlated (R2 =0.964, p =0.01) with increasing percentage of MCA-tk numeric cell count. Biodistribution results showed that [$^{125}I$]FIAU was mainly excreted via the renal system in the early phase. Ratios of MCA-tk tumor to blood acting were 10, 41, and 641 at 1 h, 4 h, and 24 h post-injection, respectively. The maximum ratio of MCA-tk to MCA tumor was 192.7 at 24 h. Ratios of MCA-tk tumor to liver were 13.8, 66.8, and 588.3 at 1 h, 4 h, and 24 h, respectively. On small animal PET, [$^{124}I$]FIAU accumulated in substantial higher levels in MCA-tk tumor and liver than MCA tumor. Conclusion: FIAU shows selective accumulation to HSV1-tk expressing hepatoma cell tumors with minimal uptake in normal liver. Therefore, radiolabelled FIAU is expected to be a useful substrate for non-invasive imaging of HSV1-tk gene therapy and therapeutic response monitoring of HCC.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.44 no.1
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• pp.53-60
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• 2012

The aim of this study was to explore the spatial and energy resolutions of a PET scanner that we have recently developed. The scanner, which consists of six detector modules with 1-layer LGSO crystals, has a hexagonal configuration with a faceto- face distance of 86.4 mm between two opposite PET modules; such properties facilitate the imaging of small animals. A $^{22}Na$ point source was employed to estimate horizontal and vertical spatial resolutions. To assess the energy resolution, a uniform $^{18}F$ cylindrical phantom was scanned. A software-based spectrum analysis of list-mode data was used to assign a local energy window centered on the photopeak position for every single crystal. For the image reconstruction, an ML-EM algorithm was used. The spatial resolutions at the center of the scanner were 0.99 mm in the horizontal direction and 1.13 mm in the vertical direction. The energy resolution averaged over each PMT ranged from 13.3%-14.3%, which gave an average value of 13.8%. These results show that this simple system is promising for small animal imaging with excellent spatial and energy resolutions.

• IEIE Transactions on Smart Processing and Computing
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• v.4 no.5
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• pp.305-310
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• 2015

We propose a new concept for a depth of interaction (DOI) positron emission tomography (PET) detector based on dual-ended-scintillator (DES) readout for small animal imaging. The detector consists of lutetium yttrium orthosilicate (LYSO) arrays coupled with orthogonal wavelength-shifting (WLS) fibre placed on the top and bottom of the arrays. On every other line, crystals that are 2 mm shorter are arranged to create grooves. WLS fibre is inserted into these grooves. This paper describes the design and performance evaluation of this PET detector using Monte Carlo simulations. To investigate sensitivity by crystal size, five types of PET detectors were simulated. Because the proposed detector is composed of crystals with three different lengths, degradation in sensitivity across the field of view was also explored by simulation. In addition, the effect of DOI resolution on image quality was demonstrated. The simulation results proved that the devised PET detector with excellent DOI resolution is helpful for reducing the channels of sensors/electronics and minimizing gamma ray attenuation and scattering while maintaining good detector performance.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.172-177
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• 2011

The purpose of this study was to analyze $^{68}Ga$-BAPEN dynamic PET image in rat myocardium to evaluate potential of this radiotracer as a perfusion imaging agent. Animal PET/CT scan was done in 9 rats during 120 minutes. Especially we synthesized $^{68}Ga$-BAPEN with kit which is simple and low cost method. PET images showed the in vivo dynamic distribution of $^{68}Ga$-BAPEN in the chest region of rats. Initially $^{68}Ga$-BAPEN PET images showed aorta and liver activities and a few minutes later, $^{68}Ga$-BAPEN moved to myocardium. Regions of interest were drawn on myocardium, liver, lung and blood pool. Time-activity curves showed significant uptake of $^{68}Ga$-BAPEN in myocardium. The contrast ratios of myocardial to blood pool, lung and liver at 60 minutes after injection were 1.66, 2.82 and 0.60. To estimate accurate kinetic parameters, 60 minutes after injection was required to PET scan as myocardium image contrast ratios reached to constant values. As a result, $^{68}Ga$-BAPEN would be suitable radiotracer for PET which can applied to diagnosis of myocardial perfusion diseases after further preclinical and clinical investigations.

• Journal of the Korean Physical Society
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• v.73 no.11
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• pp.1764-1773
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• 2018

A-PET is a quad-head PET scanner developed for use in small-animal imaging. The dimensions of its volumetric field of view (FOV) are $46.1{\times}46.1{\times}46.1mm^3$ and the gap between the detector modules has been minimized in order to provide a highly sensitive system. However, such a small FOV together with the quad-head geometry causes image quality degradation. The main factor related to image degradation for the quad-head PET is the mispositioning of events caused by the penetration effect in the detector. In this paper, we propose a precise method for modelling the system at the high spatial resolution of the A-PET using a LOR (line of response) based ML-EM (maximum likelihood expectation maximization) that allows for penetration effects. The proposed system model provides the detection probability of every possible ray-path via crystal sampling methods. For the ray-path sampling, the sub-LORs are defined by connecting the sampling points of the crystal pair. We incorporate the detection probability of each sub-LOR into the model by calculating the penetration effect. For comparison, we used a standard LOR-based model and a Monte Carlo-based modeling approach, and evaluated the reconstructed images using both the National Electrical Manufacturers Association NU 4-2008 standards and the Geant4 Application for Tomographic Emission simulation toolkit (GATE). An average full width at half maximum (FWHM) at different locations of 1.77 mm and 1.79 mm are obtained using the proposed system model and standard LOR system model, which does not include penetration effects, respectively. The standard deviation of the uniform region in the NEMA image quality phantom is 2.14% for the proposed method and 14.3% for the LOR system model, indicating that the proposed model out-performs the standard LOR-based model.