GPAIR: Gaussian-Kernel-Based Ultrafast 3D Photoacoustic Iterative Reconstruction
This work addresses the computing burden that limits practical clinical applications of 3D photoacoustic imaging, representing a significant advancement rather than an incremental improvement.
The authors tackled the problem of long reconstruction times in iterative reconstruction for 3D photoacoustic computed tomography by proposing GPAIR, which achieves orders-of-magnitude acceleration, enabling sub-second reconstruction for 8.4 million voxels in animal experiments.
Although the iterative reconstruction (IR) algorithm can substantially correct reconstruction artifacts in photoacoustic (PA) computed tomography (PACT), it suffers from long reconstruction times, especially for large-scale three-dimensional (3D) imaging in which IR takes hundreds of seconds to hours. The computing burden severely limits the practical applicability of IR algorithms. In this work, we proposed an ultrafast IR method for 3D PACT, called Gaussian-kernel-based Ultrafast 3D Photoacoustic Iterative Reconstruction (GPAIR), which achieves orders-of-magnitude acceleration in computing. GPAIR transforms traditional spatial grids with continuous isotropic Gaussian kernels. By deriving analytical closed-form expression for pressure waves and implementing powerful GPU-accelerated differentiable Triton operators, GPAIR demonstrates extraordinary ultrafast sub-second reconstruction speed for 3D targets containing 8.4 million voxels in animal experiments. This revolutionary ultrafast image reconstruction enables near-real-time large-scale 3D PA reconstruction, significantly advancing 3D PACT toward clinical applications.