Abstract: Compton cameras can offer advantages over gamma cameras for some applications, since they are well suited for multitracer imaging and for imaging high-energy radiotracers, such as those employed in radionuclide therapy. While in conventional clinical settings state-of-the-art Compton cameras cannot compete with well-established methods such as PET and SPECT, there are specific scenarios in which they can constitute an advantageous alternative. The combination of PET and Compton imaging can benefit from the improved resolution and sensitivity of current PET technology and, at the same time, overcome PET limitations in the use of multiple radiotracers. Such a system can provide simultaneous assessment of different radiotracers under identical conditions and reduce errors associated with physical factors that can change between acquisitions. Advances are being made both in instrumentation developments combining PET and Compton cameras for multimodal or three-gamma imaging systems, and in image reconstruction, addressing the challenges imposed by the combination of the two modalities or the new techniques. This review article summarizes the advances made in Compton cameras for medical imaging and their combination with PET.

Abstract: This paper investigates the Casimir energy modifications due to the Lorentz-violating CPT-even contribution in an extension of the scalar QED. We have considered the complex scalar field satisfying Dirichlet boundary conditions between two parallel plates separated by a small distance. An appropriate tensor parametrization allowed us to study the Casimir effect in three different configurations: isotropic, anisotropic parity-odd, and anisotropic parity-even. We have shown that the Lorentz-violating contributions can promote either an increase or a decrease in the Casimir energy evaluated in the isotropic configuration, depending on whether the violation parameters are taking as positive or negative values. On the other hand, for the anisotropic parity-even case the Casimir energy only decreases, while for the anisotropic parity-odd cases it only increases. Therefore, from these last two results it seems that the Casimir energy is sensitive to the parity of Lorentz-violating coefficients.

Abstract: The electron cloud populated by a multipactor within two emissive parallel plates was modeled by two thin sheets of charge, and for the first time the equations of the particle motion for this two-sheet system were derived taking into account space charge effects. The electron population growth in multipacting process was then simulated with the code developed on the base of these equations. It was found that the mutual repulsion between the sheets, i.e., space charge effects, results in the increasing of charge in one of the sheets and the loss of charge in the other due to the different growth rates. This process eventually comes to the saturation of one sheet and the dissappearence of the other.

Abstract: Treatment planning systems at proton-therapy centres entirely use X-ray computed tomography (CT) as primary imaging technique to infer the proton treatment doses to tumour and healthy tissues. However, proton stopping powers in the body, as derived from X-ray images, suffer from important proton-range uncertainties. In order to reduce this uncertainty in range, one could use proton-CT images instead. The main goal of this work is to test the capabilities of a newly-developed proton-CT scanner, based on the use of a set of tracking detectors and a high energy resolution scintillator for the residual energy of the protons. Different custom-made phantoms were positioned at the field of view of the scanner and were irradiated with protons at the CCB proton-therapy center in Krakow. We measured with the phantoms at different angles and produced sinograms that were used to obtain reconstructed images by Filtered Back-Projection. The obtained images were used to determine the capabilities of our scanner in terms of spatial resolution and proton Relative Stopping Power (RSP) mapping and validate its use as proton-CT scanner. The results show that the scanner can produce medium-high quality images, with spatial resolution better than 2 mm in radiography, below 3 mm in tomography and resolving power in the RSP comparable to other state-of-the-art pCT scanners.

Abstract: Using decays to f-meson pairs, the inclusive production of charmonium states in b-hadron decays is studied with pp collision data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3.0 fb(-1), collected by the LHCb experiment at centre-of-mass energies of 7 and 8 TeV. Denoting by B-C = B(b -> CX) x B(C -> phi phi) the inclusive branching fraction of a b hadron to a charmonium state C that decays into a pair of phi mesons, ratios R-C2(C1) = B-C1/B-C2 are determined as R-eta c(1S)(chi c0) = 0.147 +/- 0.023 +/- 0.011, R-eta c(1S)(chi c1) = 0.073 +/- 0.016 +/- 0.006, R-eta c(1S)(chi c2) = 0.081 +/- 0.013 +/- 0.005, R-chi c0(chi c1) = 0.50 +/- 0.11 +/- 0.01, R-chi c0(chi c2) = 0.56 +/- 0.10 +/- 0.01 and R-eta c(1S)(eta c(2S)) = 0.040 +/- 0.011 +/- 0.004. Here and below the first uncertainties are statistical and the second systematic. Upper limits at 90% confidence level for the inclusive production of X(3872), X(3915) and.c2(2P) states are obtained as R-chi c1(X(3872)) < 0.34, R-chi c0(X(3915)) < 0.12 and R-chi c2(chi c2(2P)) < 0.16. Differential cross-sections as a function of transverse momentum are measured for the eta(c)(1S) and chi(c) states. The branching fraction of the decay B-s(0). phi phi phi is measured for the first time, B(B-s(0) -> phi phi phi) = (2.15 +/- 0.54 +/- 0.28 +/- 0.21 B) x10(-6). Here the third uncertainty is due to the branching fraction of the decay B-s(0) -> phi phi, which is used for normalization. No evidence for intermediate resonances is seen. A preferentially transverse phi polarization is observed. Themeasurements allow the determination of the ratio of the branching fractions for the eta(c)(1S) decays to ff and p (p) over bar as B(eta(c)(1S) -> phi phi)/B(eta(c)(1S) -> p (p) over bar) = 1.79 +/- 0.14 +/- 0.32.