Simultaneous compensation for attenuation, scatter and detector response for SPECT reconstruction in three dimensions

Abstract

A three-dimensional reconstruction method for simultaneous compensation of attenuation, scatter and distance-dependent detector response for single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) is described and tested by experimental studies. The method determines the attenuation factors recursively along each projection ray starting at the intersected source voxel closest to the detector. The method subtracts the scatter energy window data from the primary energy window data for scatter compensation. The detector response is modelled to be spatially invariant at a constant distance from the detector. The method convolves source distribution with the modelled response function to compensate for the detector response. The Poisson noise is modelled by Poisson likelihood and smoothed by use of a non-uniform entropy prior to searching for the maximum a posteriori probability solution. The method was tested using projections acquired from a chest phantom by a three-headed detector system with parallel hole collimators. An improvement was shown in image noise, recognition of object sizes and shapes, and quantification of concentration ratios.