ÐÒÔË´óתÅÌ

This course has a maximum capacity of 10 students. A minimum requirement for the course to be arranged is 4 registered students.

A minimum requirement to be admitted to this course is a master’s degree or equivalent or admission to a Student Research Programme.

If the number of applicants exceeds the course capacity, the applicants will be prioritized in the following order:

1) PhD Students affiliated to the national network ‘Digital Life Norwegian Research school’.

2) PhD students, research fellows and students participating in the Medical Student Research Programme at ÐÒÔË´óתÅÌ The Arctic University of Norway (not affiliated with ‘Digital Life Norwegian Research School’).

3) PhD students and students at a Medical Student Research Programme at other universities (not affiliated with ‘Digital Life Norwegian Research School’).

4) Applicants who have minimum a master's degree or equivalent, but have not been admitted to a PhD programme.

It is recommended although not obligatory to have the radioactivity safety course (HMS-stråling del) and the FELASA Laboratory animal science course (HEL-8014).

Students will complete the course with the following achievements

Knowledge

• Have a basic understanding of the radiochemistry, radiopharmacy, biodistribution of radiotracers and the factors affecting the choice of radiotracers for a specific imaging task
• Be able to describe and discuss advantages and limitations of modern techniques for in vivo, ex vivo and in vitro preclinical molecular imaging- These techniques include Positron-Emission-Tomography (PET), Single-Photon-Emission Computer Tomography (SPECT), Magnetic Resonance (MR), Computed Tomography (CT) or Bioluminescence (BLI) imaging, autoradiography and biodistribution-studies.
• Have the theoretical foundation of preclinical molecular imaging as a modern research tool.
• Know the steps to follow during a PET/CT/MR or SPECT/CT study, including animal handling and preparatory techniques for the molecular imaging experiment, scan performance, image reconstruction, data handling and analysis and image validation methods.
• Have an insight about recents developements of radionuclide targeted diagnostic and therapy.

Skills

• Design a standard in vivo PET/SPECT/CT/MR experiment.
• In vitro validation of radiotracers
• Plan, prepare and perform a standard in vitro and ex vivo autoradiography experiments, including collection, preparation and cryo-sectioning of frozen tissue, incubation with a radiotracers and image acquisitions as well as analysis.
• Plan, prepare and perform a standard ex vivo biodistribution experiment, including sacrificing the animal after PET-tracer administration, dissection and collecting the organs of interest, measuring the radioactivity in each organ using well counter, analyze, correlate and compare the result with in vivo imaging.
• Prepare static or dynamic PET/CT/MR scan protocols, as well as a SPECT/CT imaging experiment.
• Analyse and extract useful information from the static or dynamic PET images (for example: specific uptake values (SUV) and time activity curves), as well as Evaluate the information provided by the SPECT images

Competence

• Understand the workflow of a small animal imaging study from the radiotracer development and synthesis to the in vitro validation and in vivo imaging.
• Have the capability of developing molecular imaging protocols involving PET/CT/MR and SPECT/CT.
• Identify key issues in a standard imaging study.
• Understand the potential of treating diseases with radiotherapy and radionuclide targeted therapy
• Have the overview of how to handle images as data.