A New Positioning Algorithm for Position-Sensitive Avalanche Photodiodes.

We are using a novel position sensitive avalanche photodiode (PSAPD) for the construction of a high resolution positron emission tomography (PET) camera. Up to now most researchers working with PSAPDs have been using an Anger-like positioning algorithm involving the four corner readout signals of the PSAPD. This algorithm yields a significant non-linear spatial "pin-cushion" distortion in raw crystal positioning histograms. In this paper, we report an improved positioning algorithm, which combines two diagonal corner signals of the PSAPD followed by a 45° rotation to determine the X or Y position of the interaction. We present flood positioning histogram data generated with the old and new positioning algorithms using a 3 × 4 array of 2 × 2 × 3 mm3 and a 3 × 8 array of 1 × 1 × 3 mm3 of LSO crystals coupled to 8 × 8 mm2 PSAPDs. This new algorithm significantly reduces the pin-cushion distortion in raw flood histogram image.