[Development of a high-resolution pinhole SPECT system using dual-head gamma camera for small animal studies]

We developed a high-resolution pinhole SPECT system using dual-head gamma camera (PRISM-2000XP) for small animal, and evaluated the performance of this system. Two pinhole-inserts (Pb) were mounted on the same unit, and it was not attached to the detector but the gantry of gamma camera. We designed two kinds of pinhole collimators with different rotating radii, 40 mm (Type-I) and 50 mm (Type-II). The diameter of the pinhole is 1 mm for both types. The field of view (FOV) and magnification were 45.8 mm phi and 4.25 for Type-I, 57.4 mm phi and 3.40 for Type-II, respectively. We measured full width at half maximum (FWHM) of line spread function using a 99mTc line source. Measured FWHM values were 1.65 mm using Type-I and 1.91 mm using Type-II at the center of FOV in the center slice. The volume sensitivity of this system was 8.54 kcps/MBq/ml (Type-I) and 5.68 kcps/MBq/ml (Type-II). We could observed 1.2 mm phi cold spot in the resolution phantom using Type-I. In conclusion, this system is available for SPECT measurement of small animal studies.