Dosimetric evaluation of brain scanning agents

Conventional radiopharmaceuticals used for scanning the brain are excluded from normal brain tissue by the presence of an intact blood-brain-barrier (BBB). The current generation of radiopharmaceuticals being developed is capable of crossing the intact BBB thus providing direct measurement of brain function. The dosimetry of the first generation agents is complicated by the presence of the BBB which prevents the agent from achieving uniform distribution as generally assumed in dosimetric evaluation. The second generation radiopharmaceuticals while crossing the BBB are also nonuniformly distributed in the brain. Tabulations of specific absorbed fraction data for photon emitters uniformly distributed in the gray and in the white matter regions of the brain are presented and compared to values for a uniform distribution throughout the brain. Estimates of the specific absorbed fraction for the lens of the eye and the pituitary gland are also presented. Dose values per unit cumulated activity (S-factors) are developed based on the specific absorbed fraction data. The significance of the positron component to the dose to the regions of the brain is indicated for second generation scanning agents containing carbon-11, nitrogen-13, oxygen-15, and fluorine-18