Purpose: This pilot study aimed to evaluate the amino acid tracer 18 F-FACBC with simultaneous PET/MRI in diagnostic assessment and neurosurgery of gliomas. Materials and Methods: Eleven patients with suspected primary or recurrent low-or high-grade glioma received an 18 F-FACBC PET/MRI examination before surgery. PET and MRI were used for diagnostic assessment, and for guiding tumor resection and histopathological tissue sampling. PET uptake, tumor-to-background ratios (TBRs), time-activity curves, as well as PET and MRI tumor volumes were evaluated. The sensitivities of lesion detection and to detect glioma tissue were calculated for PET, MRI, and combined PET/MRI with histopathology (biopsies for final diagnosis and additional image-localized biopsies) as reference. Results: Overall sensitivity for lesion detection was 54.5% (95% confidence interval [CI], 23.4-83.3) for PET, 45.5% (95% CI, 16.7-76.6) for contrast-enhanced MRI (MRI CE), and 100% (95% CI, 71.5-100.0) for combined PET/MRI, with a significant difference between MRI CE and combined PET/MRI (P = 0.031). TBRs increased with tumor grade (P = 0.004) and were stable from 10 minutes post injection. PET tumor volumes enclosed most of the MRI CE volumes (>98%) and were generally larger (1.5-2.8 times) than the MRI CE volumes. Based on image-localized biopsies, combined PET/MRI demonstrated higher concurrence with malignant findings at histopathology (89.5%) than MRI CE (26.3%). Conclusions: Low-versus high-grade glioma differentiation may be possible with 18 F-FACBC using TBR. 18 F-FACBC PET/MRI outperformed MRI CE in lesion detection and in detection of glioma tissue. More research is required to evaluate 18 F-FACBC properties, especially in grade II and III tumors, and for different subtypes of gliomas.

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of including bone in DIXON-based attenuation correction for 18 F-fluciclovine Positron Emission Tomography (PET) / Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) of primary and recurrent prostate cancer. Methods:18 F-fluciclovine PET data from two PET/MRI studies -one for staging of highrisk prostate cancer (28 patients) and one for diagnosis of recurrent prostate cancer (81 patients) -were reconstructed with a 4-compartment (reference) and 5-compartment attenuation map. In the latter, continuous linear attenuation coefficients for bone were included by co-registration with an atlas. The maximum and mean 50%isocontour standardized uptake values (SUV max and SUV iso , respectively) of primary, locally recurrent, and metastatic lesions were compared between the two reconstruction methods using linear mixed-effects models. In addition, mean SUVs were obtained from bone marrow in the third lumbar vertebra (L3) to investigate the effect of including bone attenuation on lesion-to-bone marrow SUV ratios (SUVRmax and SUVRiso; recurrence study only). The 5-compartment attenuation maps were visually compared to the in-phase DIXON MR images for evaluation of bone registration errors near the lesions. P-values < 0.05 were considered significant. Results: Sixty-two (62) lesions from 39 patients were evaluated. Bone registration errors were found near 19 (31%) of these lesions. In the remaining 8 primary prostate tumors, 7 locally recurrent lesions, and 28 lymph node metastases without bone registration errors, using the 5-compartment attenuation map was associated with small but significant increases in SUVmax [2.5%; 95% confidence interval (CI) 2.0%-3.0%; p<0.001] and SUViso (2.5%; 95% 3 CI 1.9%-3.0%; p<0.001), but not SUVRmax (0.2%; 95% CI -0.5%-0.9%; p=0.604) and SUVRiso (0.2%; 95% CI -0.6%-1.0%; p=0.581), in comparison to the 4-compartment attenuation map. Conclusion: The investigated method for atlas-based inclusion of bone in 18 F-fluciclovine PET/MRI attenuation correction has only a small effect on the SUVs of soft-tissue prostate cancer lesions, and no effect on their lesion-to-bone marrow SUVRs when using signal from L3 as a reference. The attenuation maps should always be checked for registration artefacts for lesions in or close to the bones.4

Nursing home residents are dissatisfied with a sedentary life indoors and reach out more to others socially when they are outdoors. Nevertheless, they have little contact with nature and the outdoor environment.

Background Patients with metastatic cancer to the brain have a poor prognosis. In clinical practice, MRI is used to delineate, diagnose and plan treatment of brain metastases. However, MRI alone is limited in detecting micro-metastases, delineating lesions and discriminating progression from pseudo-progression. Combined PET/MRI utilises superior soft tissue images from MRI and metabolic data from PET to evaluate tumour structure and function. The amino acid PET tracer 18F-FACBC has shown promising results in discriminating high- and low-grade gliomas, but there are currently no reports on its use on brain metastases. This is the first study to evaluate the use of 18F-FACBC on brain metastases. Case presentation A middle-aged female patient with brain metastases was evaluated using hybrid PET/MRI with 18F-FACBC before and after stereotactic radiotherapy, and at suspicion of recurrence. Static/dynamic PET and contrast-enhanced T1 MRI data were acquired and analysed. This case report includes the analysis of four 18F-FACBC PET/MRI examinations, investigating their utility in evaluating functional and structural metastasis properties. Conclusion Analysis showed high tumour-to-background ratios in brain metastases compared to other amino acid PET tracers, including high uptake in a very small cerebellar metastasis, suggesting that 18F-FACBC PET can provide early detection of otherwise overlooked metastases. Further studies to determine a threshold for 18F-FACBC brain tumour boundaries and explore its utility in clinical practice should be performed.

F-Fluciclovine uptake was found in parts of the tumor where regional WHO grade, cell proliferation, and cell densities were highest. This finding suggests that PET/MRI with this tracer could be used to improve accuracy in histopathologic tissue sampling and grading, and possibly for guiding treatments targeting the most malignant part of extensive and eloquent gliomas.