Fusion imaging of fluorescent and phase-contrast x-ray computed tomography using synchrotron radiation in medical biology

We integrated fluorescent X-ray computed tomography (FXCT) and phase-contrast X-ray computed tomography (PCCT), and the feasibility of this fusion imaging was assessed for small animals. Brain tumor model of mouse and cardiomyopathic model of hamsters were examined. The brain and heart were extracted after intravenous injection of cerebral perfusion agent 127I-IMP and myocardial fatty acid metabolic agent 127I-BMIPP, respectively. Each target organ was fixed by formalin for FXCT and PCCT. Images were obtained three-dimensionally (3D), and the surface contour of brain and heart were determined from 3D-image after re-sampling for the description with the same spatial resolution. These images were fused interactively on displayed images by 3D image manipulation software. In FXCT, cerebral perfusion image with IMP and fatty acid metabolic image with BMIPP were clearly demonstrated at 0.5 mm and 0.2 mm spatial resolution, respectively. PCCT image with 0.03 mm spatial resolution depicted clearly the morphological structures of brain such as cerebral cortex, hippocampus, lateral ventricle and cerebellum, and for heart such as cardiac lumen, papillary muscle, left and right ventricle. On fusion image, localization and degree of abnormality of cerebral perfusion and myocardial fatty acid metabolism were easily recognized. Our results suggested that the integration of FXCT and PCCT is very useful to understand biological state corresponding to its anatomical localization even in small animal.

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