# name
Dynamic PET-Tau Quantification for  Progressive Supranuclear Palsy Diagnosis

# metadata.dc.description[].value
Treballs Finals de Grau d'Enginyeria Biomèdica. Facultat de Medicina i Ciències de la Salut. Universitat de Barcelona. Curs: 2023-2024. Tutor: Raúl Tudela ; Director: Aida Niñerola, Raúl Tudela

# metadata.dc.description.abstract[].value
Tauopathies are neurodegenerative diseases caused by the abnormal accumulation of tau proteins 
in the brain. One uncommon tauopathy is progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), whose symptoms 
often overlap with other brain disorders, and its detection is only possible postmortem since there 
is not an available ideal biomarker.
PET-tau imaging has the potential to revolutionize the early detection of this disease. PET is a 
nuclear imaging test which allows seeing the functionality of organs and tissues in vivo using a 
radiotracer that emits radiation from inside the body. A new PET tracer called 18F-PI-2620 has 
shown promising results concerning the detection of PSP, with high affinity to tau aggregates and
low off-target binding.
This project consists of designing and testing a software for the quantification of PET images of the 
brain with a dynamic acquisition, which show the radiotracer distribution through time. The software 
performs a coregistration of the images to the standard space, where the different regions of the 
brain can be segmented using an atlas, and provides two physiologically meaningful parameters 
which are the Distribution Volume Ratio (DVR) and Standardized Uptake Value Ratio (SUVR). It 
gives out the DVR and SUVR values for any region of interest, as well as parametric images which 
help visualizing the radiotracer distribution in the brain.
A set of brain PET images from 13 subjects acquired using 18F-PI-2620 has been used for the
development and testing of the software, divided into healthy controls, subjects with Down 
syndrome, some of whom have developed Alzheimer’s disease (AD), which also implies a higher
amount of abnormal deposited tau proteins. The results have shown higher DVR and SUVR values
for several brain regions in those subjects who have developed AD, confirming that they have a 
higher radiotracer uptake and a greater amount of deposited tau proteins. This proves the correct 
functionality of the software and its potential as a future tool for detecting tauopathies such as PSP 
in combination with the radiotracer.

# metadata.dc.rights[].value
cc-by-nc-nd (c) , Santiago Romaní Ormaechea, 2024

# metadata.dc.source[].value
Treballs Finals de Grau (TFG) - Enginyeria Biomèdica

# metadata.dc.title[].value
Dynamic PET-Tau Quantification for  Progressive Supranuclear Palsy Diagnosis