1^st Tübingen PET/MR Workshop 2012

Dear Colleagues,

Medical imaging, by means of combined imaging technology, has supported clinical patient care over the past decade. Recently, a new imaging modality, PET/MRI, has been proposed for applications in humans, thus opening the door to true multi-parametric imaging. While first clinical studies are currently underway to frame the potential of combined PET/MR imaging several methodological challenges still need to be addressed before this imaging technology can be transferred in routine applications.

This workshop brings together early adopters of PET/MR technology and experts in the field of advanced PET, MRI and PET/CT imaging. The goal is to share methodical and clinical know-how and to further assess the potential of PET/MRI in various applications from preclinical research translating into applications in humans. This workshop is laid out specifically to invite professionals from complementary disciplines, such as nuclear medicine and radiology, physics and biology as well as clinicians and pharmacists. The overarching goal is to reflect the multi-disciplinary nature of the combination of imaging hardware by the multi-disciplinary panel of faculty, experts and attendees.

The structure of this workshop comprises grand rounds, parallel tutorial sessions, several hands-on classes and expert panel discussions. The results of the expert panels will be summarized in the plenary sessions of the last day of the meeting. Handout materials will be available to all registered attendees. We aim at providing a forum of expertise to independent researchers as well as to industry in an attempt to potentially help short-cut development cycles of PET/MRI and associated technologies.

This workshop is the first in a series of application-driven workshops organized by the University of Tübingen. The outcome of this workshop is planned to be summarized and expanded on during a half-day summit at the World Molecular Imaging Conference (WMIC) in 2012 in Dublin.

External speakers in 2012

• Harald H. Quick
  Head Section for MR Imaging at the Institute of Medical Physics (IMP), Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nürnberg, Erlangen, Germany.
• Markus Schwaiger
  Director of the Department of Nuclear Medicine, Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany.
• Dale Bailey
  Professor in Medical Radiation Sciences at the University of Sydney and Principal Physicist in the Department of Nuclear Medicine, Royal North Shore Hospital, Australia.
• Hans Herzog
  Head Positron Emission Tomography, Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine (INM-4), Germany.
• Osama Sabri
  Director of the Department of Nuclear Medicine at the University of Leipzig, Germany.
• Ronald Boellaard
  Head of Physics Section and Associate Professor in the Department of Nuclear Medicine & PET Research (Vumc), Neuroscience Campus, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
• Osman Ratib
  Chief of Nuclear Medicine in the Department of Radiology at the University Hospital of Geneva, Switzerland.
• Patrick Veit-Haibach
  Department of Nuclear Medicine, University Hospital in Zurich, Switzerland.
• Heinz-Peter Schlemmer
  Coordinator of the Research Program Imaging and Radiooncology, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany.
• Henryk Barthel
  Assistant Medical Director Neuro-Pet and PET-MRI, Department of Nuclear Medicine, University Hospital Leipzig, Germany.
• Sibylle Ziegler
  Chair for Computer Aided Medical Procedures & Augmented Reality, TUM, Munich, Germany.
• Dirk Hellwig
  Senior physician of the Department of Nuclear Medicine at the Saarland University Medical Center in Homburg, Germany.

Organizing Committee

• Bernd J. Pichler, PhD
  Chair, Department of Preclinical Imaging and Radiopharmacy Tübingen
• Claus D. Claussen, MD
  Managing Medical Director, University Department of Radiology, Tübingen
• Brigitte Gückel, PhD
  Scientific Study Management, Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology, Tübingen
• Christina Pfannenberg, MD
  Management PET/CT Center, Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology, Tübingen
• Holger Schmidt, PhD
  Managing Physicist PET/MR, Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology, Tübingen
• Nina Schwenzer, MD
  Management PET/MR Center, Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology, Tübingen
• Thomas Beyer, PhD
  Imaging Science Institute (ISI), Tübingen