A portable and compact positron emission tomography (pet) system with real-time adaptability

A compact, handheld gamma detector module for a positron emission tomography (PET) or single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) imaging system, comprising:

• a plurality of scintillating crystals to detect and convert gamma photons emitted by a patient to be detected to visible light;
• a plurality of photodetectors to convert the visible light to analog or digital electric signals, wherein the photodetectors are silicon photo-multipliers (SiPMs);
• reading means for reading the analog or digital signals from each of the photodetectors to capture time of arrival and energy of detected gamma event, wherein the reading means are application specific ICs (ASICs);
• a configurable integrated circuit for configuring and reading data from the reading means, wherein the configurable integrated circuit is a field programmable gate array (FPGA) Front end;
• a data serializer, for serializing the configured data, wherein the data serializer is a serializer;
• a plurality of printed circuit boards (PCBs), being provided to house electronic components so as to minimize a total volume of space enclosed by the PCBs;
• and
• holding means for mechanically holding the components, which also acts as a means of dissipating heat within the detector module, and thereby to maximize sensitive area while minimizing a total detector module volume, thereby to be unconstrained by external static structure for mechanical, power, thermal or signal flow requirements, and with minimum cabling to ease detector movement.