title: Energy and Timing Measurement with Time-Based Detector Readout for PET Applications: Principle and Validation with Discrete Circuit Components.
abstract: A new signal processing method for PET application has been developed, with discrete circuit components to measure energy and timing of a gamma interaction based solely on digital timing processing without using an amplitude-to-digital convertor (ADC) or a constant fraction discriminator (CFD). A single channel discrete component time-based readout (TBR) circuit was implemented in a PC board. Initial circuit functionality and performance evaluations have been conducted. Accuracy and linearity of signal amplitude measurement were excellent, as measured with test pulses. The measured timing accuracy from test pulses reached to less than 300 ps, a value limited mainly by the timing jitter of the prototype electronics circuit. Both suitable energy and coincidence timing resolutions (~18% and ~1.0 ns) have been achieved with 3 × 3 × 20 mm(3) LYSO scintillator and photomultiplier tube-based detectors. With its relatively simple circuit and low cost, TBR is expected to be a suitable front-end signal readout electronics for compact PET or other radiation detectors requiring the reading of a large number of detector channels and demanding high performance for energy and timing measurement.
authors: Department of Imaging Physics The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center 1515 Holcombe Blvd., Unit 1902 Houston, Texas 77030 USA.
authors: Xishan
authors: X
authors: Sun
authors: Allan K
authors: AK
authors: Lan
authors: Chad
authors: C
authors: Bircher
authors: Zhi
authors: Z
authors: Deng
authors: Yinong
authors: Y
authors: Liu
authors: Yiping
authors: Y
authors: Shao