We have demonstrated a high resolution (10 micron) X-ray scintillator plate as part of an indirect X-ray detection system. Scintillator plates are typically integrated with a 2-dimensional array of photodiodes based upon amorphous Si. This paper describes an alternative digital capture system that leverages low cost CCD/CMOS cameras. Our detector has a broad set of potential applications, however the initial target application is mammography. Full-field mammography mandates an imaging area of 180mm x 240mm or larger. Very large CCD/CMOS sensors have recently been developed for high resolution cameras, such as the 250-pixel Canon camera which has sensor dimensions of 202mm x 205mm, and could conceivably be matched to our high-resolution scintillator plate without any intervening optics for magnification. However, such large format CCD/CMOS sensors have limited availability because of low production yields and high cost considerations. On the other hand, small form (36mm x 24mm) and medium format (44mm x 33mm) CCD/CMOS-based photodiodes have become widely available at low cost due to their applications in the large markets of mobile devices and consumer cameras. We have therefore developed a simple optical scheme for utilizing four small or medium format CCD/CMOS cameras to capture a larger, high-resolution image. Current systems employed in screening mammography resolve tissue features of 75-100 microns. Suspicious features found during preliminary mammographic screenings are further investigated during diagnostic mammographic tests which use a high-resolution detector that is focused over the suspicious lesion. Typically, an area less than 100mm x 80mm, the current maximum size of our high-resolution scintillation plate, is interrogated. We show that diagnostic mammography, over an area of 100mm x 80mm, could be performed using our system with a feature resolution down to 7 microns.
In digital X-ray imaging, a crucial factor determining image resolution of all indirect detection systems is the spread of light in the X-ray scintillator. Currently deployed clinical x-ray detectors, with a resolution between 75 and 300 microns, are affected by such spread of light. This work demonstrates the significantly improved the resolution of an indirect X-ray scintillation detector using a new structuring approach The new structured scintillator consists of three main components: a high optical quality ‘channel plate’, a reflective material within the capillaries of the channel plate, and a polymer-based scintillating material that is incorporated in the capillaries. Channel plates, which are utilized for a variety of optical applications, are produced from bundles of hollow drawn borosilicate glass fibers, with repeated bundling and drawing reducing the diameter of the core and capillary pores down to values as low as 5 microns. These bundles are then cut to make high quality plates (‘channel plates’) with a thickness around 1 mm. Channel plates contain geometrically ordered capillary channels (about 5 million channels per square cm). The channel walls were coated with a 70 nm thick coating of Al2O3:W using atomic layer deposition (ALD) to optically confine the photoemission within the channel. The optical channel plates were infiltrated with a new bismuth-based scintillating polymer developed at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, with a photon yield of > 30,600 photons/keV for X-ray energies of 20-30 keV, a range of interest for mammography. The new scintillator plate was used to experimentally demonstrate an X-ray resolution of 10 microns (or 50 linepairs/ mm), an approximately 7 times improvement over existing scintillating detectors. A structured scintillator plate, coupled with a digital detection system may be used to improve the spatial resolution in applications such as mammography, radiography, and computed tomography.
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