Therapy Monitoring Based on PET Imaging

A special issue of Tomography (ISSN 2379-139X).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 August 2023) | Viewed by 7041

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Institute of Pharmaceutical Science, School of Cancer & Pharmaceutical Sciences, King’s College London, London, UK
Interests: cell therapy; cell tracking; molecular imaging; pulmonary inflammation; sepsis; immuno-PET; drug delivery

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Positron emission tomography (PET) is a powerful technique for studying biological processes in vivo and is widely used in clinical settings to detect and diagnose diseases. In addition to diagnosis, PET can also be used to monitor therapy and study drug delivery, often providing signs of response earlier than morphological imaging techniques or than the appearance of clinical symptoms. This has largely been driven by the application of [18F]FDG-PET in oncology, but there are increasing examples of therapy monitoring by PET in infectious, inflammatory, neurological and other diseases. Many questions remain, such as the optimal timeframe for therapy monitoring, the best parameters to measure, and the utility of radiotracers targeting other metabolic pathways or, more specifically, the biological mechanisms underpinning each therapy. Recent years have also seen impressive developments in immunomodulatory therapies and adoptive cell therapies, whose patterns of response are unconventional and for which standard response criteria are not always adequate. Thus, there is a need to develop novel imaging tools to accurately monitor these therapies.

 For this Special Issue, we invite investigators to contribute original research articles and reviews covering preclinical, translational and clinical studies using PET imaging to specifically monitor responses to therapy, in all types of disease. We encourage submissions covering the application of novel and established radiotracers to preclinical therapy models, PET imaging of cell therapies, theranostics and PET-guided drug delivery. We also welcome submissions covering the refinement and development of imaging biomarkers, PET radiomics and standardization issues in therapy monitoring.

Dr. Francis Man
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • molecular imaging
  • theranostics
  • cell tracking
  • immuno-PET
  • radiomics
  • therapy monitoring
  • drug delivery

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

8 pages, 2448 KiB  
Article
Visualizing Bioabsorbable Spacer Effectiveness by Confirming the Distal-Tail of Carbon-Ion Beams: First-In-Human Report
by Shintaro Shiba, Masahiko Okamoto, Makoto Sakai and Tatsuya Ohno
Tomography 2022, 8(5), 2339-2346; https://doi.org/10.3390/tomography8050195 - 21 Sep 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1908
Abstract
In particle therapy, bioabsorbable polyglycolic acid (PGA) spacer was developed to reduce the healthy organ irradiation dose, especially in the gastrointestinal tract. The PGA spacer is safe and effective; however, there are no reports that have confirmed whether the PGA spacer which inserted [...] Read more.
In particle therapy, bioabsorbable polyglycolic acid (PGA) spacer was developed to reduce the healthy organ irradiation dose, especially in the gastrointestinal tract. The PGA spacer is safe and effective; however, there are no reports that have confirmed whether the PGA spacer which inserted in the body actually stops the carbon-ion (C-ion) beams. Here, we visualized and confirmed that the PGA spacer stops the C-ion beams in the body based on the dose distribution using auto-activation positron emission tomography (AAPET). A 59-year-old dedifferentiated retroperitoneal liposarcoma patient underwent C-ion radiotherapy (C-ion RT) on referral. A month before C-ion RT initiation, the patient underwent PGA spacer placement. Postoperatively, the patient received 4.4 Gy (RBE) per fraction of C-ion RT, followed by AAPET. AAPET revealed lower positron emitter concentrations at the distal tissue ventral to the PGA spacer than in the planning target volume. In observing the efficacy of the PGA spacer, the AAPET images and the average count per second of the positron emitter suggested that the PGA spacer stopped the C-ion beams in the body in accordance with the dose distribution. Therefore, AAPET was useful in confirming the PGA spacer’s effectiveness in this study, and the PGA spacer stopped the C-ion beams. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Therapy Monitoring Based on PET Imaging)
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17 pages, 5390 KiB  
Article
A Feasibility Study on Proton Range Monitoring Using 13N Peak in Inhomogeneous Targets
by Md. Rafiqul Islam, Mehrdad Shahmohammadi Beni, Akihito Inamura, Nursel Şafakattı, Masayasu Miyake, Mahabubur Rahman, Abul Kalam Fazlul Haque, Shigeki Ito, Shinichi Gotoh, Taiga Yamaya and Hiroshi Watabe
Tomography 2022, 8(5), 2313-2329; https://doi.org/10.3390/tomography8050193 - 15 Sep 2022
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2037
Abstract
Proton irradiations are highly sensitive to spatial variations, mainly due to their high linear energy transfer (LET) and densely ionizing nature. In realistic clinical applications, the targets of ionizing radiation are inhomogeneous in terms of geometry and chemical composition (i.e., organs in the [...] Read more.
Proton irradiations are highly sensitive to spatial variations, mainly due to their high linear energy transfer (LET) and densely ionizing nature. In realistic clinical applications, the targets of ionizing radiation are inhomogeneous in terms of geometry and chemical composition (i.e., organs in the human body). One of the main methods for proton range monitoring is to utilize the production of proton induced positron emitting radionuclides; these could be measured precisely with positron emission tomography (PET) systems. One main positron emitting radionuclide that could be used for proton range monitoring and verification was found to be 13N that produces a peak close to the Bragg peak. In the present work, we have employed the Monte Carlo method and Spectral Analysis (SA) technique to investigate the feasibility of utilizing the 13N peak for proton range monitoring and verification in inhomogeneous targets. Two different phantom types, namely, (1) ordinary slab and (2) MIRD anthropomorphic phantoms, were used. We have found that the generated 13N peak in such highly inhomogeneous targets (ordinary slab and human phantom) is close to the actual Bragg peak, when irradiated by incident proton beam. The feasibility of using the SA technique to estimate the distribution of positron emitter was also investigated. The current findings and the developed tools in the present work would be helpful in proton range monitoring and verification in realistic clinical radiation therapy using proton beams. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Therapy Monitoring Based on PET Imaging)
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16 pages, 4516 KiB  
Article
Implications of the Harmonization of [18F]FDG-PET/CT Imaging for Response Assessment of Treatment in Radiotherapy Planning
by Elisa Jiménez-Ortega, Raquel Agüera, Ana Ureba, Marcin Balcerzyk, Amadeo Wals-Zurita, Francisco Javier García-Gómez and Antonio Leal
Tomography 2022, 8(2), 1097-1112; https://doi.org/10.3390/tomography8020090 - 12 Apr 2022
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2275
Abstract
The purpose of this work is to present useful recommendations for the use of [18F]FDG-PET/CT imaging in radiotherapy planning and monitoring under different versions of EARL accreditation for harmonization of PET devices. A proof-of-concept experiment designed on an anthropomorphic phantom was [...] Read more.
The purpose of this work is to present useful recommendations for the use of [18F]FDG-PET/CT imaging in radiotherapy planning and monitoring under different versions of EARL accreditation for harmonization of PET devices. A proof-of-concept experiment designed on an anthropomorphic phantom was carried out to establish the most suitable interpolation methods of the PET images in the different steps of the planning procedure. Based on PET/CT images obtained by using these optimal interpolations for the old EARL accreditation (EARL1) and for the new one (EARL2), the treatment plannings of representative actual clinical cases were calculated, and the clinical implications of the resulting differences were analyzed. As expected, EARL2 provided smaller volumes with higher resolution than EARL1. The increase in the size of the reconstructed volumes with EARL1 accreditation caused high doses in the organs at risk and in the regions adjacent to the target volumes. EARL2 accreditation allowed an improvement in the accuracy of the PET imaging precision, allowing more personalized radiotherapy. This work provides recommendations for those centers that intend to benefit from the new accreditation, EARL2, and can help build confidence of those that must continue working under the EARL1 accreditation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Therapy Monitoring Based on PET Imaging)
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