The availability of synchrotron x-ray radiation advanced micro-focused x-ray generators has sparked new developments in computed tomography (CT), giving rise to a new generation of x-ray microtomography (XMT) instrumentation. XMT carries the CT techniques to their limits in spatial resolution and contrast sensitivity. Thus, the ability to make precise x-ray attenuation measurements on ever-smaller volume elements is made possible by XMT. These advantages have been exploited by scientists in both medical and non-medical applications. Additionally, developments in detectors, computing technology, and 3D visualization have made XMT even more attractive as a research tool. Capabilities of current XMT scanners, however, are severely limited by the existing x-ray sensors. Using conventional sensors, there exists a problematic tradeoff between the thickness and spatial resolution due to lateral light spreading. Persistence of these sensors further limit the scanning speed. To address these issues, we propose to develop a novel scintillator to be incorporated into CCD based XMT systems. The new scintillator will suppress the lateral spread of scintillation light even when the structure is made very thick. For the x-ray energies typically used in XMl, this sensor will provide high resolution, high detection efficiency and fast scanning speed, allowing the full potential of XMT technique to be realized.
In addition to the application of microtomography, the proposed development of novel pixelized scintillator would find widespread use in instrumentation wherever high-resolution x-ray. imaging is used. The technology of micro-machining is adaptable to a wide range of sensors including solid-state detectors, thus opening an access to a wide x-ray imaging market which is currently estimated to be in hundreds of millions of dollars. They may be applied to digital mammography, non-destructive testing, diffraction instruments, and several other medical imaging systems.
