Optical tomography in small animals with time-resolved Monte Carlo methods
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Authors
Chen, Jin
Issue Date
2012-08
Type
Electronic thesis
Thesis
Thesis
Language
ENG
Keywords
Biomedical engineering
Alternative Title
Abstract
In this thesis, mathematical reconstruction models for time-resolved whole-body functional and molecular imaging in small animals were developed and optimized. These models were based on the Monte Carlo approach which is considered the most accurate model to simulate light propagation in bio-tissue. The reconstruction procedures were implemented under a massively parallel environment for computational efficiency. The novel reconstruction method was applied to quantitative estimation of intrinsic optical properties, then to direct reconstruction of functional parameters (blood volume and relative oxygenation maps) in small animals. Furthermore, this method was validated experimentally with widefield illumination techniques, which led to a significant reduction of computational and experimental time. The feasibility of the model in imaging fluorescence markers with lifetime contrast was also established through simulations, phantom and animal studies, and the information content for different time gates was analyzed. Additionally, the model was compared to other available Monte Carlo based methods for time efficiency, with an evaluation of the parameters affecting the computational burden. Lastly, a mesh-based Monte Carlo method for wide-field illumination was developed to further accelerate the calculation and improve accuracy.
Description
August 2012
School of Engineering
School of Engineering
Full Citation
Publisher
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY