TY - CHAP
T1 - Advanced X-ray Imaging Technology
AU - Pfeiffer, Daniela
AU - Pfeiffer, Franz
AU - Rummeny, Ernst
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - Since their discovery by Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen in 1895, X-rays have become the most widely available, typically fastest, and usually most cost-effective medical imaging modality today. From the early radiographic approaches using X-ray films as detectors, the portfolio of medical X-ray imaging devices developed into a large range of dedicated instrumentation for various applications. While X-ray imaging has come a long way, there are some physical properties of X-rays, which have not yet been fully exploited, and which may offer quite some room for further enhancements of current X-ray imaging equipment. Firstly, X-ray imaging today is mainly black and white, despite the fact that X-ray generators actually create a full spectrum of X-ray energies, and that the interactions of X-rays that occur within the human body are not the same for all energies and every material. Exploiting these spectral dependencies allows to not only obtain a black and white CT image, but also to obtain more molecularly specific information, which is relevant particularly in oncological precision radiology. The second aspect of X-rays, and so far in radiology mainly neglected and unused, is the physical fact that X-rays can also be interpreted in the wave picture, and not only as presently been done in the particle picture. If interpreted as waves, X-rays—just like visible light—experience a phase shift in matter, and this—if exploited correctly—can produce a new class of X-ray images, which then depict the wave interactions of X-rays with matter, rather than only the attenuating properties, as done until now.
AB - Since their discovery by Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen in 1895, X-rays have become the most widely available, typically fastest, and usually most cost-effective medical imaging modality today. From the early radiographic approaches using X-ray films as detectors, the portfolio of medical X-ray imaging devices developed into a large range of dedicated instrumentation for various applications. While X-ray imaging has come a long way, there are some physical properties of X-rays, which have not yet been fully exploited, and which may offer quite some room for further enhancements of current X-ray imaging equipment. Firstly, X-ray imaging today is mainly black and white, despite the fact that X-ray generators actually create a full spectrum of X-ray energies, and that the interactions of X-rays that occur within the human body are not the same for all energies and every material. Exploiting these spectral dependencies allows to not only obtain a black and white CT image, but also to obtain more molecularly specific information, which is relevant particularly in oncological precision radiology. The second aspect of X-rays, and so far in radiology mainly neglected and unused, is the physical fact that X-rays can also be interpreted in the wave picture, and not only as presently been done in the particle picture. If interpreted as waves, X-rays—just like visible light—experience a phase shift in matter, and this—if exploited correctly—can produce a new class of X-ray images, which then depict the wave interactions of X-rays with matter, rather than only the attenuating properties, as done until now.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85087253795&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/978-3-030-42618-7_1
DO - 10.1007/978-3-030-42618-7_1
M3 - Chapter
C2 - 32594383
AN - SCOPUS:85087253795
T3 - Recent Results in Cancer Research
SP - 3
EP - 30
BT - Recent Results in Cancer Research
PB - Springer
ER -