ILUMINA Study:PC-CTA to assess Coronary Plaque Morphology & Physiology
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Next generation coronary plaque characterisation and computation of flow patterns: photon counting computed tomography coronary angiography versus state-of-the-art multimodality intravascular imaging
IRAS ID
367063
Contact name
Christos Bourantas
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Queen Mary University of London
Duration of Study in the UK
3 years, 0 months, 3 days
Research summary
Coronary artery disease, caused by the furring up of the heart arteries by atherosclerosis, is a major cause of death in the UK. Despite existing therapies, the event rate remains high, especially in patients who already had a heart attack as some of these have aggressive atherosclerotic disease. If we could identify these vulnerable patients, then in wider clinical practice in the future we might be able to treat them better with new therapies that can otherwise be expensive or come with a risk of side-effects. Traditionally, the assessment of atherosclerotic disease and the identification of the plaques that will cause heart attacks is performed using invasive imaging - imaging taken by passing a wire into the arteries of the heart that has a camera on its tip. Invasive imaging, however, can be used only in patients with symptoms and has risks. Photon counting (PC) CT is a new CT system that has image quality comparable to invasive imaging and can be used in the community to examine individuals with stable angina symptoms. In this study we aim to compare PC-CT and invasive imaging in detecting high-risk plaques and develop a platform that will expedite the analysis of CT images to allow its broad use in the clinical practice.
REC name
North West - Greater Manchester South Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
26/NW/0069
Date of REC Opinion
9 Apr 2026
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion