University of Chicago

Koninklijke Philips Corporation N.v.

Arch Development Corporation

Charles A Pelizzari

Yu Zou

Maryellen L Giger

Lifeng Yu

Xiaochuan Pan

Howard J Halpern

Chien-min Kao

Emil Sidky

Dan Xia

Martin King

Seungryong Cho

Ralph R Weichselbaum

Shunmugavelu D Sokka

Chin-Tu Chen

Gregory S Karczmar

George T Chen

Samuel Hellman

The present disclosure provides for effective systems and methods for increasing target tissue conspicuity within a particular anatomy of a particular patient. In an exemplary embodiment, a system associated with the present disclosure includes: (a) a MRI-guided HIFU system for generating ablation markings on a target tissue region, the MRI-guided HIFU system including a transducer for delivering HIFU to the target tissue region, the delivered HIFU generating the ablation markings on the target tissue and an MRI imaging system adapted to generate a three dimensional image of the target tissue region during HIFU delivery for guiding the delivery of the HIFU to the target tissue region; (b) a radiotherapy delivery system for delivering radiotherapy treatment to the target tissue region; and (c) a CT imaging system operable within the radiotherapy delivery system for generating a three dimensional image of the target tissue region. The markings generated on the target tissue region by the MRI-guided HIFU are visible in the image generated by the CT imaging system. The image generated by the CT imaging system guides the location of the radiotherapy treatment delivered to the target tissue region.

MRI-guided HIFU marking to guide radiotherapy and other procedures

A method and apparatus for reconstruction of a region of interest for an object is provided. The reconstruction of the object may be based on chords which may fill a part, all, or more than all of the region of interest. Using chords for reconstruction may allow for reducing data acquired and/or processing for reconstructing a substantially exact image of the ROI. Moreover, various methodologies may be used in reconstructing the image, such as backprojection-filtration, and modified filtration backprojection.

Imaging system

A method and apparatus for reconstruction of a region of interest (ROI) for an object using an imaging system is provided. The imaging system may substantially exactly reconstruct the ROI with a straight line trajectory. In the straight line trajectory, the ROI is not bounded or encircled by the actual trajectory of the source (e.g., no chords that are composed from two points on the source trajectory intersect or fill the ROI to be imaged). However, the ROI may be substantially reconstructed by using 'virtual' chords to reconstruct the ROI. The virtual chords are such that no point on the trajectory is included in the virtual chord (such as one that is parallel to the straight line trajectory). These virtual chords may intersect and fill the ROI, thus enabling substantially exact reconstruction. Further, in reconstructing the image, the straight line trajectory may be assumed to be infinite in length.

Imaging system performing substantially exact reconstruction and using non-traditional trajectories

In some embodiments, an image-guided radiotherapy apparatus and method is provided in which a radiotherapy radiation source and a gamma ray photon imaging device are positioned with respect to a patient area so that a patient can be treated by a beam emitted from the radiotherapy apparatus and can have images taken by the gamma ray photon imaging device. Radiotherapy treatment and imaging can be performed substantially simultaneously and/or can be performed without moving the patient in some embodiments. The gamma ray photon imaging device can be coupled and movable with respect to any part of a building structure, can be located on a portable frame movable to and from the radiotherapy radiation source and patient, or can take other forms. In some embodiments, the gamma ray photon imaging device can be used for imaging in connection with other types of medical interventions.

Image-guided medical intervention apparatus and method

Herein is described a method for creating composite images from disparate sets of tomographic images. The images may be derived from CAT, MRI or PET systems. Initially, a 'head' is created from one set of tomographic image slices. The head comprises a three dimensional stack of contours created from such slices. A 'hat' is created from another set of tomographic image slices with the hat being described by a plurality of points with coordinate positions which define the three dimensional surface of stack of image slices. The hat is then superimposed over the head and subsequently, a determination is made by examination of side and top planar views of the hat and head, of a factor which defines the mean distance of the hat points from the head contours. The hat is subsequently adjusted relative to the head until the mean distance is found to be within minimum limits.

Means to correlate images from scans taken at different times including

Growing community of inventors

Western Springs, IL, United States of America

Charles A Pelizzari