J-PET: a novel particle detector for imaging of positronium properties in living organisms

The detection system of the conventional PET tomography is programmed to record data on annihilation into (at present two) photons and it provides only information on the distribution of a radiopharmaceutical in the body of the object. Positron injected to the human body creates in about 40% cases the bound state of electron and positron, the positronium atom. Currently, in the PET technique, the phenomenon of positronium production is neither recorded nor used for imaging. We will present the Jagiellonian Positron Emission Tomograph (J-PET) which is the first PET built from plastic scintillators. J-PET prototype consists of 192 detection modules arranged axially in three layers forming a cylindrical diagnostic chamber with the inner diameter of 85 cm and the axial field-of-view of 50 cm. An axial arrangement of long strips of plastic scintillators, their small light attenuation, superior timing properties, and relative ease of increasing the axial field-of-view opens promising perspectives for the cost effective construction of the whole-body PET scanner, as well as construction of MR and CT compatible PET inserts. Status of the commissioning of the first J-PET prototype as well as status of the development of the second fully modular and portable J-PET tomograph will be presented and discussed