The offeror proposes to develop a system for rapid storage and retrieval of very large quantities of digital image data such as might be found in the next generation of digital subtracted angiography systems designed for minimally invasive imaging of the coronary arteries or other deep arteries. The image mass storage system is to be constructed by interfacing an array of latest generation parallel transfer computer disks to a very high bandwidth data acquisition and computer interconnection bus (the """"""""Fastbus,"""""""" IEEE standard 960) developed by the National Bureau of Standards with Department of Energy funding to meet the substantial computing needs of the next generation of experiments in Elementary Particle Physics. The resultant data acquisition and storage system features data transport approximately 16 times faster, and data storage at least 4 times faster, than the current generation of 30 frame/second, 512 x 512 pixel/frame digital radiography systems just becoming commercially available. It is expected that Fastbus technology could be rapidly integrated into commercial radiography systems once increases in framing rate, spatial resolution, and/or video signal to noise ratio warrant such enhancements in performance requirements of image storage systems.
