Novel Approach to Repeated Arterial Blood Sampling in Small Animal PET: Application in a Test-Retest Study with the Adenosine A1 Receptor Ligand [11C]MPDX

Purpose Small animal positron emission tomography (PET) can be used to detect small changes in neuroreceptor availability. This often requires rapid arterial blood sampling. However, current catheterization procedures do not allow repeated blood sampling. We have developed a procedure which allows arterial sampling on repeated occasions in the same animal.