FUNDAMENTALS OF MEDICAL IMAGING

 

COURSE DESCRIPTION

This full-day course is intended to introduce the fundamentals of medical imaging to engineers and physicists that have no experience in this field.  The class begins with a brief overview of the various technologies used to obtain medical images.  The focus then shifts to in-depth descriptions of individual techniques.  Beginning with the fundamentals of tomographic reconstruction, this presentation is followed by one-hour discussions of the medical imaging modalities of X-ray CT, single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), positron emission mammography (PET), and nuclear magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).  Emphasis will be placed on the underlying physical principles, instrument design, performance criteria, and clinical applications.

No prior knowledge of medical imaging techniques or computed tomography is assumed; however, the course does assume an understanding of physics, elementary radiation detection and measurement techniques, and a basic understanding of Fourier analysis.  The registration fee includes refreshments and lunch, a copy of the lecture notes, and a certificate of completion.


TOPICS AND COURSE OUTLINE:

  • Overview
    • Why are there so many medical imaging techniques
    • Basic principles of commonly used techniques
    • Advantages and disadvantages of commonly used techniques
    • New, emerging techniques
  • Tomographic Image Reconstruction
  • X-ray CT
    • CT fundamentals
    • Major components and designs
    • Key performance parameters
    • Image Artifacts and corrections
    • Helical CT
    • Multi-slice CT
    • Recent advancement in clinical applications
  • SPECT
    • Overview and fundamentals
    • Collimator systems – the resolution / efficiency tradeoff
    • Electronically collimated SPECT
    • Photon detector and camera systems
    • Image reconstruction methods
    • Corrections for gamma-ray attenuation and Compton scattering
    • Clinical uses
  • PET
    • Fundamentals of PET
    • Conventional detector design and evaluation
    • Alternate detector designs
    • Attenuation correction methods
    • Effects of Compton-scatter
    • Radiotracer selection
    • Clinical uses
  • MRI
    • Basic NMR physics – Larmor and Bloch equations
    • Roles of magnetic fields for MRI (static, gradient, RF)
    • Derivation of pulse sequences
    • Sampling, field-of-view, and resolution issues
    • Image formation methods


STAFF:

Neal Clinthorne, University of Michigan.  Neal is a Scientist in the Nuclear Medicine/Radiology.  His research interests include SPECT, PET, X-ray CT, and optical imaging instrumentation, and image reconstruction techniques.

Jeff Fessler, University of Michigan.  Jeff is an Associate Professor in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department, the Biomedical Engineering department, and in Nuclear Medicine / Radiology.  He currently serves as Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging. His primary research focus is on the statistical aspects of imaging problems, and he has supervised graduate student research in PET, SPECT, X-ray CT, MRI, and optical imaging problems.

Jiang Hsieh, General Electric Medical Systems.  Jiang is a Chief Scientist in the Applied Science Laboratory.  His primary research interests include pre-processing, image reconstruction, post-processing, and advanced clinical applications of CT.  His research interests also include various aspects of SPECT imaging.

William W. Moses, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.  Bill is a Senior Staff Scientist in the Center for Functional Imaging.  His research interests include PET instrumentation development and the study of scintillation mechanisms.