RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Optical Imaging of Ionizing Radiation from Clinical Sources
JF Journal of Nuclear Medicine
JO J Nucl Med
FD Society of Nuclear Medicine
SP 1661
OP 1666
DO 10.2967/jnumed.116.178624
VO 57
IS 11
A1 Travis M. Shaffer
A1 Charles Michael Drain
A1 Jan Grimm
YR 2016
UL http://jnm.snmjournals.org/content/57/11/1661.abstract
AB Nuclear medicine uses ionizing radiation for both in vivo diagnosis and therapy. Ionizing radiation comes from a variety of sources, including x-rays, beam therapy, brachytherapy, and various injected radionuclides. Although PET and SPECT remain clinical mainstays, optical readouts of ionizing radiation offer numerous benefits and complement these standard techniques. Furthermore, for ionizing radiation sources that cannot be imaged using these standard techniques, optical imaging offers a unique imaging alternative. This article reviews optical imaging of both radionuclide- and beam-based ionizing radiation from high-energy photons and charged particles through mechanisms including radioluminescence, Cerenkov luminescence, and scintillation. Therapeutically, these visible photons have been combined with photodynamic therapeutic agents preclinically for increasing therapeutic response at depths difficult to reach with external light sources. Last, new microscopy methods that allow single-cell optical imaging of radionuclides are reviewed.