Nuclear medical imaging techniques (such as PET and SPECT) using whole body cameras show great potential for breast cancer imaging, as they can image tumors with contrast greatly exceeding that of conventional x-ray mammography. This has spurred development of smaller cameras that image only the breast or axillary (armpit region) lymph nodes, as these cameras promise higher efficiency, higher resolution, and lower cost than whole body cameras. After motivating the need for such instruments and providing some background on nuclear medical imaging, I will describe our group's efforts in this area. One design is based upon a PET detector module in which a number of LSO scintillator crystals are read out using a photomultiplier tube, a silicon photodiode array, and a custom integrated circuit. Another design for imaging single gamma emitting tracers is based on an array of CsI:Tl scintillator crystals read out with a back-side illuminated photodiode array and a custom integrated circuit.
Bill Moses is a Senior Staff Scientist at the Center for Functional Imaging at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. His main research interest is the development of instrumentation for Nuclear Medical Imaging, primarily for positron emission tomography (PET). This includes development of: (1) new dense inorganic scintillators for gamma ray detection, (2) novel photodiode array designs for measuring scintillation light, (3) custom integrated circuits containing arrays of low noise charge sensitive amplifiers, (4) new detector designs and scanner geometries incorporating the above elements, and (5) tomographic reconstruction algorithms incorporating the additional information available from these and other novel detector designs.
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SF Bay Area | 
Berkeley | 
LBL map |
24-13 map | From highway 24 or 13, take the Berkeley/Tunnel Road/13 exit. Tunnel Road becomes Ashby past the Claremont Hotel. Turn right at the traffic light at College Ave (at the Wells Fargo Bank). Turn right at the traffic light at Durant (one-way street located one block before College Ave ends at the UC campus). At the end of Durant (one block), turn left onto Piedmont, which becomes Gayley Road. Turn right at the traffic light at Hearst at the northeast corner of the campus. Hearst becomes Cyclotron Road. At the LBL guard station the guard can give you instructions to Building 2, Room 100B.
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Alternative route from 24-13 (Green line on map; shorter, but through residential neighborhood): On Ashby, turn right at Claremont Ave. (at gas station; second traffic light after main entrance to Claremont Hotel). Immediately bear left around the "island", with the restaurant on it. You will find yourself driving through a wrought iron and brick gateway if you have performed this maneuver properly. Proceed to the end of the street to a forced left turn onto Derby at the UC-Clark Kerr campus. Turn right at Warring at the southwest corner of the campus. After two blocks, follow the road as it bears to the left to join Piedmont Ave at the traffic light (stay in the right lane on Piedmont to avoid a forced left turn at Haste). Continue along Piedmont until it becomes Gayley Road and proceed as described in the previous paragraph.
