The Role of Artificial Intelligence in Theranostics

Abstract

The recent reinvigoration of theranostics comes with advances in computing technology, radiochemistry, and instrumentation that synergize with developments in artificial intelligence (AI). There is a wide array of applications of AI in nuclear medicine that have translational benefits to theranostics, including attenuation correction, artifact and noise reduction, enhanced workflow, and lesion characterization, and segmentation and quantitation, among many others. For theranostics, there are potentially significant applications that could move closer to precision medicine. Perhaps the most important application is predictive dosimetry from diagnostic images to optimize therapeutic dose. There are also valuable benefits from AI-augmented radioligand design and development, preclinical imaging, and practice sustainability. Generative AI has also emerged as a powerful tool to support decision-making, information dissemination, and medical image analysis. There are, however, several ongoing challenges that must be considered pertaining to the development and application of AI tools in theranostics.