Optimization of system parameters for modulator design in x-ray scatter correction using primary modulation

Hewei Gao; Lei Zhu; Rebecca Fahrig

doi:10.1117/12.843984

Translator Disclaimer

22 March 2010 Optimization of system parameters for modulator design in x-ray scatter correction using primary modulation

Hewei Gao, Lei Zhu, Rebecca Fahrig

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 7622, Medical Imaging 2010: Physics of Medical Imaging; 76222A (2010) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.843984
Event: SPIE Medical Imaging, 2010, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

The impact of the system parameters of the modulator on X-ray scatter correction using primary modulation is studied and an optimization of the modulator design is presented. Recently, a promising scatter correction method for X-ray computed tomography (CT) that uses a checkerboard pattern of attenuating blockers (primary modulator) placed between the X-ray source and the object has been developed and experimentally verified. The blocker size, d, and the blocker transmission factor, α, are critical to the performance of the primary modulation method. In this work, an error caused by aliasing of primary whose magnitude depends on the choices of d and α, and the scanned object, is set as the object function to be minimized, with constraints including the X-ray focal spot, the physical size of the detector element, and the noise level. The optimization is carried out in two steps. In the first step, d is chosen as small as possible but should meet a lower-bound condition. In the second step, α should be selected to balance the error level in the scatter estimation and the noise level in the reconstructed image. The lower bound of d on our tabletop CT system is 0.83 mm. Numerical simulations suggest 0.6 < α < 0.8 is appropriate. Using a Catphan 600 phantom, a copper modulator (d = 0.89 mm, α = 0.70) expectedly outperforms an aluminum modulator (d = 2.83 mm, α = 0.90). With the aluminum modulator, our method reduces the average error of CT number in selected contrast rods from 371.4 to 25.4 Hounsfield units (HU) and enhances the contrast to noise ratio (CNR) from 10.9 to 17.2; when the copper modulator is used, the error is further reduced to 21.9 HU and the CNR is further increased to 19.2.

Citation Download Citation

Hewei Gao, Lei Zhu, and Rebecca Fahrig "Optimization of system parameters for modulator design in x-ray scatter correction using primary modulation", Proc. SPIE 7622, Medical Imaging 2010: Physics of Medical Imaging, 76222A (22 March 2010); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.843984

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE