Abstract
We investigate the specific problem of efficient coupling and transmission of light from a small inorganic crystal into optical fibre. The long-term goal of our project is the construction of a dual Positron Emission Tomography (PET)-Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scanner. The technique discussed in this paper can efficiently transport the scintillator light out of the high magnetic field and constrained spatial volume of the MRI magnet bore to a convenient and low-field region meters away without affecting the homogeneity of the MRI field. Presented are measurements and calculations on the coupling and transmission of light created in a 2.45 × 2.45 × 10 mm crystal of LSO suitable for high-resolution PET. We find that a solution for transport of the light particular to our PET-MRI interests is via optical fibre bundles of 200 μm core fibres butted against the end of the crystal. These small core fibres are better suited than their larger diameter counterparts as they permit a smaller bending radius and have a similar packing fraction. Our results indicate that the small LSO crystal butted to a hexagonally packed bundle of 176 fibres of 3 m length produces adequate scintillation light for PET applications.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 455-462 |
| Number of pages | 8 |
| Journal | Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research, Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment |
| Volume | 399 |
| Issue number | 2-3 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Nov 11 1997 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This work was supported by grants from the University of Auckland Research Committee, the Auckland Medical Research Foundation, Health Research Council of New Zealand, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH/lR29-CA65523-OlAl). We thank Dr. C. Melcher for use of the LSO crystals.