An overview on the research of spectral CT in liver cancer

Liver cancer is a common digestive malignant cancer. Early diagnosis and early treatment are important for the prognosis of the patients and the improvement of the cure rate. As an advanced imaging technique, spectral CT provides plenty of information for the diagnosis with the advantages of high scanning speed, multiple imaging parameters and low radiation dose, hence the spectral CT has been rapidly applied in recent years. In this review, we briefly introduced the principle of spectral CT, and summarized the research progress of spectral CT in the diagnosis of liver cancer. Compared to the previous CT techniques, spectral CT can provide quantitative measures for the differential diagnosis of liver cancer, and is a new tool for the scientific research of liver cancer. (authors)