Comparative evaluation of photon cross section libraries for materials of interest in PET Monte Carlo simulations

the many applications of Monte Carlo modelling in nuclear medicine imaging make it desirable to increase the accuracy and computational speed of Monte Carlo codes. The accuracy of Monte Carlo simulations strongly depends on the accuracy in the probability functions and thus on the cross section libraries used for photon transport calculations. A comparison between different photon cross section libraries and parametrizations implemented in Monte Carlo simulation packages developed for positron emission tomography and the most recent Evaluated Photon Data Library (EPDL97) developed by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory was performed for several human tissues and common detector materials for energies from 1 keV to 1 MeV. Different photon cross section libraries and parametrizations show quite large variations as compared to the EPDL97 coefficients. This latter library is more accurate and was carefully designed in the form of look-up tables providing efficient data storage, access, and management. Together with the optimisation of the computing time performances of the Monte Carlo software package, Eidolon, photon transport in 3D PET could be efficiently modelled to develop accurate scatter models and better understand scatter correction techniques.