(left)Lucas Yamamoto in scanner at Brookhaven (1967); (centre) the NaI scanner after Neuro-McGill upgrade (1975). (right), the world's first PET cross section scan of a glioma (1975). 

 

With the team in the Cone Laboratory, Lucas was a key figure in developing PET with a Germanium-68 generator and with Krypton-77 uniquely produced by the physicists and radiochemists at McGill's Foster synchrocyclotron. In 1978 the first PET scanner using Bismuth-Germanate crystal detectors was designed, constructed and tested by Christopher Thompson, Lucas Yamamoto and Ernst Meyer; it became the prototype for many scanners elsewhere. The clinical findings from this BGO scanner "The Positome" were presented at the 1st International Symposium on PET held at the Montreal Neurological Institute in 1978, at which reports from all ten of the world centres reviewed the exciting technical and clinical advances in this emerging imaging field.

Cerebrovascular Studies


Yamamoto, Feindel and Hodge comparing the effects of coke and
 pepsi on cerebral blood flow (1967).











 

 

 






(A) fluorescein angiogram of the dog brain showing laminar flow in veins (arrow) (B) after occlusion of midline veins, depicting reverse laminar flow (arrow) and perivenous hemorrhages (asterisks) (1968).

Lucas and his associates in the Cone Laboratory, carried out a vigorous schedule of research for which they devised experimental models of cerebrovascular disorders to elucidate collateral flow, hyperemia and "red veins", carotid-cerebral arterial anastomoses, cerebral vasospasm, brain edema, and the possible role of retrograde venous perfusion in treating acute cerebral ischemia. We worked closely with Charles Hodge to create (1966) fluorescein angiography of the brain both for experimental use and for application in the operating room to treat cerebrovascular malformations. Lucas was author or co-author of over 300 scientific reports.

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