Research Team for Neuroimaging

Jun Toyohara, Ph.D.

The purpose of the team is investigation of aging and geriatric diseases, especially brain functions, using positron emission tomography (PET). The PET Center established at 1990 has been renewed in the new hospital/institute building at 2013, and basic and clinical PET studies and clinical diagnosis can be performed consistently. PET is a nuclear medicine technique in which the subject is administered with positron emitting radiopharmaceuticals and is scanned with a PET camera to visualize functions of the brain and other organs. The PET Center houses a cyclotron, hot labs with radiosynthesis systems, PET cameras, and a computer network. The team members have been conducting basic and clinical research regarding PET in collaboration with other research teams, Tokyo Metropolitan Geriatric Hospital (TMGH), universities and research institutes. The PET Radiopharmaceutical Sciences group is responsible for development of new PET probes, their first clinical trails, translational researches, and in vitro and in vivo studies using small animal PET scanner and MRI apparatus. The Diagnostic Neuroimaging Research group mainly investigates clinical application of PET and provides a highly advanced PET-based diagnosis as research outcome to patients in the TMGH and other hospitals. Our team supports strongly clinical PET diagnosis at the TMGH.