The multi-source inverse-geometry CT(MS-IGCT) system is composed of multiple sources and a small 2D detector array. An experimental MS-IGCT system was built and we report initial results with 2×4 x-ray sources, a 75 mm inplane field-of-view (FOV) and 160 mm z-coverage in a single gantry rotation. To evaluate the system performance, experimental data were acquired from several phantoms and a post-mortem rat. Before image reconstruction, geometric calibration, data normalization, beam hardening correction and detector spectral calibration were performed. For reconstruction, the projection data were rebinned into two full cone beam data sets, and the FDK algorithm was used. The reconstructed volumes from the upper and lower source rows shared an overlap volume which was combined in image space. The reconstructed images of the uniform cylinder phantom showed good uniformity of the reconstructed values without any artifacts. The rat data were also reconstructed reliably. The initial experimental results from this rotating-gantry MS-IGCT system demonstrated its ability to image a complex anatomical object without any significant image artifacts and to ultimately achieve large volumetric coverage in a single gantry rotation.

Date Published: 3 March 2012
PDF: 7 pages
Proc. SPIE 8313, Medical Imaging 2012: Physics of Medical Imaging, 83131A (3 March 2012); doi: 10.1117/12.912207

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 8313:
Medical Imaging 2012: Physics of Medical Imaging
Norbert J. Pelc; Robert M. Nishikawa; Bruce R. Whiting, Editor(s)