Evaluating the Feasibility of C-arm CT for Brain Perfusion Imaging: An in vitro Study

摘要

C-arm cone-beam CT (CBCT) is increasingly being used to supplement 2D real-time data with 3D information. Temporal resolution is currently limited by the mechanical rotation speed of the C-arm which presents challenges for applications such as imaging of contrast flow in brain perfusion CT (PCT). We present a novel scheme where multiple scans are obtained at different start times with respect to the contrast injection. The data is interleaved temporally and interpolated during 3D reconstruction. For evaluation we developed a phantom to generate the range of temporal frequencies relevant for PCT. The highest requirements are for imaging the arterial input function (AIF) modeled as a gamma-variate function. Fourier transform analysis of the AIF showed that 90% of the spectral energy is contained at frequencies lower than 0.08Hz. We built an acrylic cylinder phantom of diameter 1.9 cm, with 25 sections of 1cm length each. Iodine concentration in each compartment was varied to produce a half-cycle sinusoid variation in HU in version 1, and 2.5 cycles in version 2 of the phantom. The phantom was moved linearly at speeds from 0.5cm/s to 4cm/s (temporal frequencies of 0.02Hz to 0.09Hz) and imaged using a C-arm system. Phantom CT numbers in a slice reconstructed at isocenter were measured and sinusoidal fits to the data were obtained. The fitted sinusoids had frequencies that were within 3±2% of the actual temporal frequencies of the sinusoid. This suggests that the imaging and reconstruction scheme is adequate for PCT imaging.