The H/M ratio with the ME collimator, after application of the TEW or IDW methods, was close to the theoretical value in the phantom study. However, the corrected H/M ratios with the LEHR collimator provided comparable H/M ratios to the uncorrected ME data in phantom and clinical studies.

Our SPECT system, utilizing a semiconductor camera, permits high quantitative analysis by virtue of its low scatter radiation and high sensitivity. Therefore, this system may contribute to molecular imaging of small animals and basic medical research.

Attenuation correction of myocardial SPECT with an X-ray CT image is a simple and potentially beneficial method for clinical use, but accurate registration of the X-ray CT to SPECT image is essential for satisfactory attenuation correction.

Several resolution recovery (RR) methods have been developed. This study was aimed to validate the following performance of the advanced RR methods: Evolution, Astonish, Flash3D, and 3D-OSEM. We compared the advanced RR method with filtered back projection (FBP) and standard order-subset expectation maximization (OSEM) using resolution (RES), cylinder/sphere (CYS), and myocardial (MYD) digital phantoms. The RES phantom was placed in three spheres. Sixteen spheres (hot and cold) were then placed in a concentric configuration (diameter: 96-9.6 mm) inside the CYS phantom. The MYD phantom was created by computer simulation with the use of an electron γ-shower 4 (EGS4) and it included two left ventricular defects in the myocardium. The performance was evaluated at source-to-detector distances (R-distance) of 166, 200, and 250 mm with reconstruction parameters (product of subset and iteration: SI) with use of the resolution recovery factor, count recovery, normalized mean square error (NMSE), and %CV. According to increased SI updates, the value of the FWHM decreased, and the effect was more obvious as the R-distance increased. The spatial resolution of the advanced RR method was 20 % better than that of FBP and OSEM. The resolution recovery ratio was 80 %, and the count recovery was maintained only in objects with a diameter of >30 mm in the advanced RR method. The NMSE and %CV was 50 and 30 % improved over FBP and OSEM, respectively. The advanced RR method caused overestimation due to Gibbs's phenomenon in the marginal region when the diameter of the sphere was 16-28.8 mm.

The results indicated that the semiconductor-based gamma camera is superior in performance to the Anger-type and has the possibility of being used as a positron emission computed tomography (PET) scanner.