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Multi-material beam hardening artifacts reduction in computed tomography

In computed tomography (CT), non-linear characteristics of beam hardening are caused by polychromaticity of x-rays, which severely degrade CT image quality and diagnostic accuracy. Current correction approaches used in clinical CT are mainly based on water-equivalent calibration and recent scientific researches published an extension of including dense bones in the scan field. This approach makes assumptions of certain material types, which are only partially valid and may lead to suboptimal corrections. Other correction techniques are limited in correction effectiveness and computational complexity on cone beam geometry, when scanned objects consist of more than one material.

The aim of this project is to effectively reduce beam hardening artifacts with datasets consist of multi-materials:
1) Analysis and evaluation of algorithms for state-of-the- art beam hardening artifacts algorithms.
2) Development of algorithms with consideration of inhomogeneous density objects.
3) GPU acceleration for 3D reconstruction geometry

Project manager:
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Joachim Hornegger, Dr. Nicole Maass, Dr. Matthias Elter

Project participants:
Qiao Yang, M. Sc.

Keywords:
3D CT reconstruction; beam hardening; CT image quality

Duration: 1.9.2011 - 31.8.2014

Sponsored by:
Siemens AG, Healthcare Sector

Contact:
Yang, Qiao
Phone +49 9131 85 27894, Fax +49 9131 85 27270, E-Mail: qiao.yang@cs.fau.de
Publications
Yang, Qiao ; Elter, Matthias ; Scherl, Holger : Accelerated quantitative multi-material beam hardening correction (BHC) in cone-beam CT. In: ESR (Ed.) : Scientific Exhibit (Insights Into Imaging (European Congress of Radiology (ECR)) Vienna, Austria 01-05.03.2012). 2012, pp C-2161.
[doi>10.1594/ecr2012/C-2161]
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