Interdisciplinary Project (IDP) with minor Medicine: Development of a flexible PET system model class

Positron Emission Tomography (PET) is a widely extended medical imaging modality with applications in oncology, neurology and cardiology. Due to the projective nature of the acquired data, PET images must be computed by means of a reconstruction algorithm. Most of these algorithms rely on a system matrix, a linear system representing the relationship between the image space where the patient is and the projective space of the acquired data.

The system matrix of a PET system can be obtained by means of direct measurement, simulation or analytical computation. Regardless of the chosen technique, an accurate model of the system geometry is required for this purpose.

The main goal of this project will be the design and implementation of a C++ class representing a generic system model. This class should encode the position and properties of all the detectors of the PET system, as well as provide the basic geometrical primitives for the computation of the system matrix. A simple interface to define new system geometries is required.

Depending on the particular interests of the student, the work can be extended with:
- Investigation of different analytical system models (literature research)
- Implementation and comparison of system matrix computation routines.
- Validation of the resulting system matrix on clinical data.

Good programming skills in C++ are required for this project.

The project is to be done at the Nuclear Medicine Department, Klinikum Rechts der Isar.

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