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Over the past few years, there have been considerable advances in our understanding of the molecular pathways and micro-environmental conditions that underpin cancer cell survival and treatment resistance. These studies have facilitated the development of a range of new agents that target specific cancer-associated pathways, processes or tumour-specific environmental conditions. Many of these new agents are not designed to be used as stand-alone therapies, but rather in combination with standard treatments to improve overall response. In addition, depending on the precise mode of action, there is also the added potential benefit of more "molecularly" targeted agents having reduced side-effects, thereby enabling an improved therapeutic index.
In this special edition of the British Journal of Radiology, we have asked a number of leading experts in the field of dementia imaging to review the current role and contribution of various imaging modalities to our understanding and clinical management of dementias.
Radiation Biology is a relatively new discipline that has contributed significantly to our understanding of the science of radiation. However, our challenges for the future are to translate the knowledge compiled during many years of research on the radiation response of cells and animals to man. This will only be achieved by integrating the skills of biologists, chemists, physicists, physicians and many others working in this field. Interaction between these diverse expertise has been the goal of ARR meetings and will certainly form the new ERRS. The papers in this volume reflect the diversity of current research in the field of radiation and were initially chosen on their scientific merit. The papers were subsequently peer reviewed as per the BJR policy. This volume includes articles on the mechanisms of action and methods of modification of radiation damage. It is hoped that highlighting these aspects of radiation damage will help in further understanding the complex phenomenon of radiation damage.
Perceptual issues in radiology are becoming more important in an age where image data sets face radiologists with unprecedented workloads, image presentation changes occur with regular frequency, and practitioners have to adapt to new working methods involving machine intelligence and second reading. The Medical Image Perception Society's biannual conference takes a singular interest in the interaction of observer and visual decision task and continues to be a source of multi-disciplinary support to medical imaging. The papers contained here represent the ways in which this community of researchers brings together the techniques and methods of many disciplines with the aim of improving practical radiology.
These are exciting times in radiotherapy imaging and this special issue reflects both the current practice and future opportunities for exploiting advances in several imaging modalities in order to increase the confidence with which modern conformal radiotherapy treatments may be planned and delivered.
Positron emission tomography (PET) is a non-invasive, quantitative imaging technique that can visualise biochemical, physiological and biological processes in vivo. It is the most specific and sensitive molecular imaging technique in man. In recent years, PET has emerged as a valuable tool for tumour diagnosis, disease staging and treatment monitoring. In particular, PET has great potential as an important component of the radiotherapy treatment process. Although CT is the current gold standard for disease staging, PET has the potential to refine and improve this, and to provide powerful biological information. PET also provides a unique opportunity to assess response to anticancer therapy and to evaluate the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of novel anticancer agents. An increased understanding of key tumour biological parameters such as metabolism, hypoxia, proliferation and blood flow will be provided as PET imaging methods are exploited to study cellular and molecular processes in vivo. To provide an update on the current status of PET in radiotherapy and oncology, international experts in the field came together on the 27 January 2005 at the British Institute of Radiology for a 1-day meeting entitled "The role of PET scanning within radiotherapy". This successful meeting, held in collaboration with the National Translational Cancer Research Network (NTRAC), aimed to raise awareness of the potential of PET scanning in the wider community and to highlight the research areas necessary to develop PET as a useful clinical entity within the National Health Service. This special issue is comprised of summary papers based on keynote talks at the meeting, providing an up-to-date overview of developments in the field and ideas for the future promise of PET in radiotherapy.
During recent years the importance of working together across professional disciplines has been increasingly recognized in the management of cancer. This issue clearly demonstrates the benefits of such an approach. I believe that this special issue of the BJR provides a valuable contribution to the literature in pelvic malignancy and will be helpful in guiding developments in clinical practice.
Computer-aided detection (CAD) has been developed over the last 20 years following advances in computer technology and software programs as well as improved image capture techniques with higher resolution. Using technology initially designed for military defence programmes and observatories, applications in medical imaging have evolved. The aim is often to improve reader sensitivity and specificity in a particular application, such as mammography, but other benefits are becoming apparent. A meeting was held at the British Institute of Radiology to bring together the scientific, industrial and medical communities to discuss the current position. This special edition of the British Journal of Radiology publishes the papers presented at the meeting.
The development of multislice CT (MSCT) has been a major leap forward in CT technology. The first MSCT scanner was introduced in clinical practice late in 1998 and allowed four contiguous slices to be scanned per rotation at the high speed of 0.5 s. Recently, MSCT machines that can scan 8, 16 or 32 contiguous slices per rotation at subsecond times have been introduced. The potential of MSCT is tremendous, but consensus on the best use of this versatile technology has not yet been reached. In addition, the radiation dose to the patient remains a source of concern with MSCT. In this Special Issue of the BJR, several authors will share their experience of the use of MSCT and will describe in detail practical scanning and imaging protocols in different clinical settings.
In this special edition leading experts in areas of complex image analysis each review their area of expertise in a format that is aimed at the clinician. Each article is intended to give the clinician who is interested in the technique a detailed introduction to the area, an overview of the analysis problems and solutions that are being commonly applied and some idea of the potential developments to be expected. At first sight of these articles may appear to be off-puttingly technical and there are certainly quite a lot of equations in some of the articles. However, we hope you will persevere in trying to read them since all the authors have taken great efforts to make sure that the articles can be read by those who are unfamiliar with the mathematical and technical complexities of image analysis.
Much work has been done to try to establish imaging tests as biomarkers and even "surrogate endpoints" for various angiogenesis therapies. However, initial results have been mixed (see articles by Galbraith and Padhani in this journal issue) probably due to a combination of factors the most important of which may be the lack of understanding of the biological and molecular basis for the different imaging phenotypes in different disease environments. With the increased scientific momentum in the field of angiogenesis, imaging scientists should strive to exploit both imaging and non-imaging tools so that the full potential of imaging can be realised.
This special issue of the British Journal of Radiology highlights the growing importance and interest in the field of molecular imaging. The imaging of individual molecular events has been catalysed by two important developments; one, our understanding of the molecular basis of disease and two, the development of drugs directed at those molecular targets.
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