A Simulation study to determine the influence of low-energy bremsstrahlungs photons on the acquisition of very rare coincidence events from Yttrium-90 decay.


A Simulation study to determine the influence of low-energy bremsstrahlungs photons on the acquisition of very rare coincidence events from Yttrium-90 decay.

Thomas, L.; Sauerzapf, S.; Mix, M.; Zakhnini, A.; Gaens, M.; Axer, M.; Pietrzyk, U.

AIM
In the course of treating liver cancer, frequently SIRT (selective internal radiation therapy) with Yttrium-90 is applied. In order to study the bio-distribution, often SPECT or SPECT/CT imaging is used, based on the detection of low-energy bremstrahlung photons. However, there is also another imaging option, namely through observation of the very rare internal pair production of Y-90, leading to an experimental situation well suited for PET (2). The aim of this study is to study the influence of the low-energy bremsstrahlung photons, which come at relatively high count-rate, but at the same time preserving the PET signal, i.e. the two gammas originating from the e+-e- annihilation, since only 32 out of one million decays of Yttrium-90 happen via internal pair production.

METHODS
The normal decay channel, the emission of therapeutically used electrons with high energy, comes with the production of low energy bremsstrahlung photons. Despite their relatively low energy (only a fraction of 16,6% of such photons exceeds more than 300 keV), the high-count rate could lead to saturation effects (via pulse pile-up) of the PET detector electronics. To absorb these low-energy photons, it was suggested to insert a copper ring into the gantry (1). To analyze a) where or not such a ring is required and b) which material might be best suited, we simulated a Siemens MicroPET Focus 120 and the PET part of a Philips Gemini TOF PET-CT with GATE (2) with different ring materials and a contrast medium filled phantom. Results from simulations were compared with experimental data obtained from measurements under condition comparable to the simulation.

RESULTS
First preliminary results from the simulation showed, that a 0.5 cm thick copper ring absorbs the low-energy bremsstrahlung, while preserving those at higher energy around 511 keV. In contrast, a ring of 0.5 cm of lead also absorbs many of the gammas around 511 keV. However, so far it is not certain, whether such a ring made of copper or lead would be required at all. Further studies are needed, especially with taking into account the signal processing chain as offered by GATE to differentiate further options in improving the detection of very rare signals for PET. Additional measurements might also provide more details of what exactly the PET-images show, because a superposition of the bremsstrahlung photons from interacting electrons with the true coincidence signals cannot be ruled out.
CONCLUSION
Our first results of distributions of simulated and measured events from Y-90 internal pair production look promising. The PET-images show very clear distributions of Y-90, yet need further confirmation, especially studying the influence of pile-up, dead-time effects on the rare coincidence signal.

(1) R Lhommel et al: Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging (2009) 36:1696.
(2) S Jan et al: GATE V6. Phys. Med. Biol. (2011) 56 881-901.

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Publ.-Id: 16325