Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray computed tomography

Bruce R. Whiting,a Parinaz Massoumzadeh, and Orville A. Earl

Electronic Radiology Lab, Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, Washington University School of Medicine,
St. Louis, Missouri 63110

Joseph A. OSullivan and Donald L. Snyder

Electronic and Systems Engineering, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri 63130

Jeffrey F. Williamson
Medical College of Virginia, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia 23298

Received 25 January 2006; revised 16 June 2006; accepted for publication 22 June 2006;
published 24 August 2006
The accurate determination of x-ray signal properties is important to several computed tomography
CT research and development areas, notably for statistical reconstruction algorithms and dosereduction simulation. The most commonly used model of CT signal formation, assuming monoenergetic x-ray sources with quantum counting detectors obeying simple Poisson statistics, does not
reflect the actual physics of CT acquisition. This paper describes a more accurate model, taking into
account the energy-integrating detection process, nonuniform flux profiles, and data-conditioning
processes. Methods are developed to experimentally measure and theoretically calculate statistical
distributions, as well as techniques to analyze CT signal properties. Results indicate the limitations
of current models and suggest improvements for the description of CT signal properties. 2006
American Association of Physicists in Medicine. DOI: 10.1118/1.2230762
Key words: x ray, computed tomography, probability distribution function, flux uniformity, signal
detection, energy-integrating detection
I. INTRODUCTION
The introduction of computed tomography CT in the early
1970s revolutionized diagnostic imaging. In the past decade
CT has experienced rapid advancement in technical performance in terms of expanded volume coverage and faster scan
times, enabling new clinical applications such as population
screening and real-time cardiac imaging. In addition to improving hardware design, challenges for continued progress
in CT include better reconstruction algorithms to extract
more information from scan measurements, and developing
scan protocols to reduce the risk of associated radiation exposure. Potential solutions for these two tasks rely on accurate physical models of CT signal properties.1
Iterative reconstruction algorithms, based on statistical
optimization principles, hold promise to minimize noise and
artifact impact, allowing more quantitative diagnostic
information.2 Linear reconstruction algorithms, such as filtered back projection, equally weight the contributions of all
measurements to the reconstructed image, implicitly assuming that the signal-to-noise ratio SNR is constant for all
measurements. Typically, even statistically based reconstruction algorithms, which attempt to improve results by inversely weighting the contribution of measurements to an
image by the estimated noise in the measurement, have assumed a homogenous beam flux incident on the object in
actual implementations. In order to minimize patient radiation dose, however, modern scanner designs have evolved to
produce a beam flux that is nonuniform in space, due to
bowtie equalization filters, and time, due to adaptive tubecurrent modulation. The development of statistical recon3290

Med. Phys. 33 9, September 2006

struction algorithms depends explicitly on a model assumed

for the noise behavior, requiring accurate description of signal properties.
Dose-reduction simulation, using synthetic-noise generators, enables ethical studies of low-dose procedures to determine as low as reasonably achievable ALARA
protocols,3 particularly important for pediatric imaging.
Dose-reduction simulations have been reported3,4 using Poisson or Gaussian noise models with random number generators. However, the accuracy of the simulations, particularly
under low-flux conditions, has not been extensively tested
and carries caveats from the developers.5
To date, CT reconstruction algorithms and noise simulators have used relatively simple representations of CT data
acquisition. The common model for noise estimation considers a monoenergetic x-ray source that generates quanta that
are attenuated by the scanned object, and detectors that count
the number of surviving quanta,6 with the signals that are
generated being governed by Poisson statistics. This model
explains general observed trends of signals and noise with
exposure and object attenuation. Actual scanner operations,
however, are quite different: an x-ray tube generates quanta
having a spectrum of continuously variable energies, the
quanta are transmitted through objects undergoing random
interactions in a way that is strongly energy dependent, and
then the x rays interact with detectors, transforming their
deposited energy into secondary optical photons that are converted to a continuous electrical signal that is integrated over
time and ultimately digitally sampled. Additionally, in order
to achieve artifact-free images with linear reconstruction algorithms filtered backprojection, actual measurement data

0094-2405/2006/339/3290/14/$23.00

2006 Am. Assoc. Phys. Med.

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Whiting et al.: Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray CT

must be conditioned to account for variations of individual

detector response and nonlinearities in the energy transmission process. This processing can further modify statistics of
recorded signals.
Previous research has partially addressed some aspects of
the more accurate scenario described above. On the theoretical side, there is a large body of work on the effects of
polyenergetic spectra on x-ray imaging. For projection imaging, Tapiovaara,7 Rabbani,8 VanMetter,9 and others demonstrated the role of spectral effects on signal statistics, such as
the mean and variance of signals, signal-to-noise ratio, and
their propagation through linear systems. However, calculations of probability density functions pdfs for actual polyenergetic measurements have not been presented and, usually, Gaussian distributions were assumed based on the
central limit theorem10 for high-flux levels. In CT, the existence of beam-hardening artifacts due to polyenergetic
sources naturally led to examination of energy-spectral effects. Both Morgenthaler11 and Sandborg12 demonstrated that
the response of specific detector mechanisms would lead to
different signal properties. Chesler13 discussed the relationship of projection measurement sinogram noise to the noise
in reconstructed images. Nevertheless, most maximum likelihood reconstruction algorithms assumed simple Poisson
statistics2 and until very recently, extension of theoretical
pdfs has not been explored beyond basic Poisson
distributions,14 which become Gaussian at high count levels
20.
On the experimental side, researchers typically do not
have access to raw sinogram data, which are considered proprietary by vendors. This has severely limited analysis of
actual measurement statistics, so pdfs or even methods to
measure pdfs have not been presented until very
recently.15,10 Furthermore, the effects on signal statistics of
signal conditioning and data processing have not been addressed.
Therefore the motivations for this research were to explore aspects of the total acquisition process, including effects such as energy spectral effects, nonuniform beam flux,
and data conditioning; to determine the importance of these
effects under clinical scan conditions; and to arrive at accurate models that can contribute to advancing CT imaging.

II. METHODS AND MATERIALS

A. Theoretical models

1. X-ray signal sources

An x-ray tube produces polyenergetic x rays, with a distribution of energies described by the spectrum E, which
depends on the maximum applied tube potential kVp and
inherent filtration, has units of keV1, and is normalized to
unity when integrated over energy kVp
0 EdE = 1. The
mean number of total quanta interacting with a detector per
measurement, I0, depends on the solid angle subtended by
the detector element, the tube current mA, and the time
duration of the measurement. The generation of individual
quanta in a CT scanner is a random process,16 with the probMedical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

3291

ability of observing a certain number of quanta within a particular energy range during a certain measurement period
given by a Poisson distribution that is characterized by a
mean number of quanta per measurement, i.e., I0EE. As
this primary x-ray beam passes through physical material, it
is attenuated by random absorption and scattering events in
an energy-dependent fashion, and the mean number of surviving quanta, IsE, is described by Beers law,17

IsE = IooEexp iEti ,

i

where ti represents the thickness of material i present in the

beam path, and i is the linear attenuation coefficient of the
material i as a function of energy. A property of independent
Poisson processes is that when they are combined, the result
is also a Poisson process, with the means being additive and
the resulting pdf being the convolution of the constituent
pdfs. Thus the mean of the total number of x rays of all
energies measured will be ID and actual measurements of
quanta will be distributed according to a Poisson pdf with
mean ID.
For this study, representative x-ray spectra were generated
by the software program Xcomp5 Ref. 18, which includes
bremsstrahlung radiation according to the Birch and Marshall model19 as well as characteristic x rays. The program
requires inputs of kVp, tube angle, source-to-detector distance, and tube filtration, and provides spectra with discrete
energy intervals E = 1 keV, air kerma, half-value layers
HVL, and flux intensity factors. The material attenuation
coefficients and densities for determining attenuation factors
were obtained from the National Institute of Standards and
Technology NIST website.20 Examples of representative
x-ray spectra at a CT detector for air and water attenuation
are shown in Fig. 1.

2. Detectors
The attenuated x-ray beam described above that exits an
object is measured by detectors, which convert the x-ray flux
into an electrical signal and eventually to a digital value. The
interaction of each x-ray quantum with a detector is also a
random process, with an energy-dependent absorption E
= 1 expdetEtdet, where detEtdet is the attenuation
in the detector. For modern solid state detectors such as
1.2 mm of Gd2O2S this absorption efficiency is relatively
high21 almost unity for energies 70 keV, 70% at
150 keV and the interaction process is governed by binomial statistics. When a binomial process acts on a Poisson
process, the result is a Poisson process with an effective
flux lowered to an amount equal to the absorbed signal,
EIsE.8
Once an x-ray quantum is absorbed in the detector, the
conversion process is characterized by a mean energydependent gain, gE, so that the generalized mean signal S
is defined as

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FIG. 1. Input spectra generated for a CT scanner 7 tube angle, 120 kVp,
104 cm distance, 12 mm Al Cu filtration for air a and 30 cm water attenuation b. The HVL of the incident spectrum is 8.8 mm Al, with a flux
level of 1.09 106 photons per mAs mm2. The mean photon energy increases from 66.1 to 78.4 due to beam hardening. The energy resolution is
1 keV; characteristic peaks are actually 1 2 keV wide.

S = I
o

gEEEexp EtdE,

where E is the incident spectrum and Et is the total

object attenuation at energy E along a measurement ray.
The form of gE varies, depending on the mechanism of
the signal generating process:
Quantum counterassigns equal weight to each
quantum, regardless of its energy: gE = C, i.e., C
converts the counts into measurement units. Currently, this simple model is the most commonly used
description for analyzing x-ray imaging systems. Because the counter combines random Poisson processes at each individual energy level, the resulting
signal is also Poisson. Existing physical devices that
can implement this mode are rather constrained by
limited counting rates for medical imaging conditions, which could be 106 / measurement, but recently this has become an active area for device
research.22
Energy integrating detectorrecords a signal
strength proportional to the energy imparted to the
detector, gE = GE, i.e., G is the conversion factor
from x-ray energy keV to signal, e.g., mV, mA.
This is representative of current CT scanners. Highenergy x rays having energies of several thousands
of electron volts are assumed to be locally down
converted in sensor materials to create multiple
electron-hole pairs individually having energies of a
few electron volts, typically resulting in hundreds of
secondary charge pairs for each primary x ray. This
charge can be detected directly in gaseous or solid
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3292

state sensors, or, in most contemporary scanners, the

recombination of electron-hole pairs in scintillators
can lead to optical photons that are detected by photodiodes or other means. In either case, the amount
of signal generated by the down conversion is proportional to the energy of the x-ray quantum. This
conversion process is itself also random in nature,8
but the gains in CT sensors are such that this is a
negligible contribution to the overall noise level.23 In
this paper a constant, noiseless gain process will be
assumed. The signals are usually integrated for a
time period of about a millisecond to record a total
signal that is essentially a continuous function
rather than a set of discrete measurement levels that
a counter would record.
Other types of detection schemesnovel sensor concepts are under active investigation. For instance,
Cahn24 and Marchal25 have proposed using energy
discriminators with E3 weighting to accentuate contrast and minimize the effects of beam hardening.

3. Scanner model
Besides the x-ray source and detection process, several
additional factors significantly influence each individual
x-ray CT measurement and must be accounted for.
Nonuniform flux across fan beam. This is generated
by at least two effects. First, bowtie filters are introduced into the beam to minimize patient dose. Because most human anatomy is nominally circular in
cross section, with more attenuation in central areas
compared to the periphery, a uniform flux that gives
acceptable signal-to-noise ratio in the center of the
patient would give higher SNR through the edge of
the patient but at the expense of unnecessary dose
there. A tapered filter is used to attenuate flux toward
the fan-beam edges while maintaining adequate
overall SNR. The magnitude of this exposure reduction can be quite large, up to a factor of 10 or more.
A second source of nonuniformity is due to the heel
effect: Modern x-ray tubes generate a fan-beam
plane that is normal to the scan axis, while the plane
of the target anode surface is at an oblique angle to
the scan axis. Rays at an increasing angle in the fan
beam have a longer exit path in the anode and experience more attenuation in the target; hence there is a
falloff in intensity at a higher fan-beam angle, estimated to be on the order of 4%. Consider a 60-keV
electron striking a tungsten anode with a tube angle
of 7 and a fan-beam angle of +/26. Using the
method of Fritz and Livingston,26 the mean electronstopping distance will be 6 m, resulting in an exit
distance in the anode ranging between 49 and 54 m
across the fan beam. The self-attenuation of tungsten
will lead to a decrease in intensity of 4% at the edge
of the fan beam relative to the central ray. Therefore, the heel effect is much smaller in magnitude

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Whiting et al.: Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray CT

than the bowtie filter attenuation. The conventional

heel effect in the longitudinal direction is also relatively small, as the maximum cone-beam angle in a
16-row detector is less than 1.2 resulting in a variation of +/2.6% across detector rows. For a 64-row
device, the cone beam angle is 2.6 and the heel
effect would increase to +/4.9%. These beam nonuniformities are, of course, calibrated out of the firstorder signal response in order to avoid visible artifacts but will influence noise properties.
Tube current modulation. Various schemes have now
been implemented to minimize patient dose by actively increasing and decreasing tube current in response to patient attenuation.27,28 In the course of
one gantry revolution, this will vary incident flux by
factors of 510 and nominally equalize the flux actually incident on the detectors. Again, normalization
of the log-ratio measurement removes any first-order
variation due to current variation, but second-order
properties of noise are affected.
Electronic noise. The analog detection electronics
can introduce additional noise due to thermal noise
or bias currents. This is designed to be a very small
additive amount, which will be significant only at
very low signal levels, and is expected to consist of
white noise with a normal Gaussian distribution.
Quantization noise. The analog-to-digital conversion
ADC of the signal results in loss of information
and, hence, additional variance. Modern electronic
designs use a linear ADC on the electrical signal and
then store the digital information in a logarithmic
domain as a scaled integer. In both conversions there
is a contribution to noise variance of magnitude
2 / 12, where is the appropriate representative
quantization step size.29 In the ADC conversion, the
quantization limits small signals and may introduce
high attenuation noise. In the logarithmic domain
large signals with high SNR will be limited by the
quantization, impacting the low attenuation image
areas. In either case, quantization can affect noise
statistics.29 In modern systems both effects are designed to contribute a negligible amount of noise,
such as one-half of the minimum expected noise
level.
Data conditioning. Tomographic reconstruction using filtered backprojection requires data that represent the ray integral of the attenuation coefficients of
an object. To convert linear transmission measurements to this form involves creating a logarithmic
ratio and providing a polynomial correction for polyenergetic beam hardening,

Ameas = log

aS0 + b
,
aSm + b

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3a

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2
Acorr = Ameas + cAmeas
,

3b

where a is the gain of the detector, b is its offset, S0

is the unattenuated reference signal, Sm is the measured signal, and c is the coefficient for a secondorder beam-hardening correction. In an actual scanner, there are thousands of individual detectors, each
with varying gains, offsets, and energy responses
a , b , c, plus in each gantry revolution, thousands of
measurements are obtained with some variability in
reference signal S0. Note that errors/variations in
the data conditioning coefficients could contribute to
signal statistic properties.
Additional effects that exist in real scanner signals
that are not addressed in the present model include:
scattered radiation, crosstalk between detector channels, and temporal response effects. While these are
expected to be small, they are outside the scope of
this paper.

4. Stochastic process models

The probability density function appropriate for an x-ray
quantum counter detector is a simple Poisson, which is characterized by the mean number of quanta ID and gives the
probability of measuring a discrete integer number of
quanta N,
PN,ID =

N ID
e
ID
.
N!

For an energy integrator, where each quantum contributes

a random amount of energy, the pdf is that for marked
processes, known as Compound Poisson statistics,30 given by

PS, =

N=0

N
ID
S/G NeID
,
N!

where S is the measured signal, G is the energy conversion

factor, ID is the mean total number of quanta per measurement, and S / G N is the N-fold convolution of the energy
spectrum including detector efficiency. This has been derived elsewhere by mathematically performing Fourier transforms of characteristic functions appropriate for each
model,15 and a more intuitive explanation of its origin is
given in Appendix A. The probability distribution functions
can be implemented using either direct convolution or Fourier methods Fig. 2.
In order to compare objectively the theoretical pdfs for
various detector models with experimental results, it is useful
to compute moments of their distributions, particularly the
mean and first three cumulants known as variance, skewness, and kurtosis. These can be computed directly from
pdfs, but for theoretical models the properties of a Poisson
process make it very convenient to calculate these system
characteristics explicitly. Making use of the fact that the
x-ray quanta generation process is governed by Poisson
statistics,6 the cumulants are additive. Because each spectral

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3294

The amount of kurtosis of the pdf relative to the

width of the pdf decreases with the inverse of exposure: 4I0 2 = 4 22I0 .
As exposure increases, the pdf will approach a
Gaussian distribution characterized by a mean 1I
and variance 2I, with negligible higher moments, as
expected from the central limit theorem.

FIG. 2. Plot of first ten pdfs for exactly N quanta formed by convolution of
original spectra from 35.4 cm PMMA cylinder and overall pdf scaled by a
factor of 10 for visibility for mean quanta number= 5. Note that the fine
structure of the spectrum is blurred after several convolutions.

The most often used statistical properties of a signal are

its mean and variance. In comparing different models,
Shaw31 proposed using noise equivalent quanta NEQ, the
ratio of the square of the mean to the variance of the signal,
i.e., the signal-to-noise ratio squared, as a figure of merit. For
comparing detector models, another useful quantity is excess
noise, which is the ratio of the variance of a measurement to
the variance that monoenergetic system would have at the
same mean count ID.

B. Experimental techniques

component E is individually Poisson with mean

IoEE, the mean and first three central moments of each
spectrum point will be IogEEE, Iog2EEE,
Iog3EEE, Iog4EEE1 + 3EE, respectively, where the gain gE is the scaling factor for the spectral component. Since the cumulants of added random processes are additive, the overall summary statistics mean,
variance, skewness, kurtosis will be proportional to

1 =

kVp

gEEdE,

g2EEdE,

g3EEdE,

g4E 322EdE.

2 =

kVp

3 =

kVp

4 =

kVp

Hence, one can compute the appropriate cumulant factor

from the base spectrum, given by the pdf weighting of the
appropriate detector quantity, and the cumulant for any flux
level is then just scaled to be I0. For a simple Poisson
process, all the cumulant ratios i = 1, while for Compound
Poisson processes i 1. The following general behavior is
observed for all models:
The variance is proportional to the mean: 2 = 2I0
= 2 1I 0 / 1.
The amount of skewness of the pdf relative to the
width of the pdf decreases with inverse square root
I0 .
of exposure: 3I0 3/2 = 3 3/2
2

Medical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

Experiments were performed to gather data to characterize signals in clinical CT scanner systems. Several generations of CT scanners all manufactured by Siemens Medical
Solutions, Forchheim Germany were tested, including
single-row helical scanners Somatom Plus 4, four-row
scanners Somatom Volume Zoom, and sixteen-row scanners Somatom Sensation 16. Sinogram data files were exported from the system via optical disks or network transfer
for analysis.
The sinogram data consisted of attenuation measurements, i.e., the logarithm of the ratio of unattenuated signal
to measured signal, as well as a recording of the tube current
for each measurement. The attenuation data has been corrected for beam hardening, detector nonuniformity, and tubecurrent fluctuation Eq. 3. To execute these measurements
and corrections at a rate of millions per second requires
implementation of a signal-processing chain with low-level
hardware and firmware; as a result, the original data measurements or coefficients used by individual detectors are not
accessible for inspection. Numerous inquiries were made to
several CT manufactures regarding availability of uncorrected measurements or individual correction coefficients.
Such information was not available for any of the scanners
presented in this paper. Of the eight scanner designs accessible in the authors institutions, only two of them provided
access to uncorrected raw data in a service-maintenance
mode. While this means that the statistics of the dataconditioning chain cannot be examined directly, the requirements for human visual sensitivity to detecting artifacts place
constraints on the resultant errors caused by such signal
processing.32 That is, artifacts introduced by mismatched detectors or tube current fluctuations, such as linear streaks or
ring artifacts in images, will be detectable at a contrast level
of about 0.15% on the order of one Hounsfield Unit, corresponding to an NEQ of 500 000. The absence of such artifacts in image slices implies that the conditioning is accurate to at least this visualization level, and hence the impact

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FIG. 3. Cylinder phantom and mechanical fixture for measurements of pdfs.

of conditioning image statistics will be of second order in

comparison to the underlying acquisition statistics Appendix B.
The range of signals encountered in clinical CT can be
quite large. The incident flux varies as much as a factor of
100, i.e., e4.6. mAs can vary by an order of magnitude and
effective detector size by a factor of 210. Attenuation values for patients vary from 0 air to 15 in a very large patient
a range of 3 106, so the total span of signals potentially
could be 500 106 28 bits. Because clinical scanners provide only a limited amount of direct control of mA, collimation and rotation time typically the product range varies
50, it is not possible to measure over the whole clinical
range of signals by only varying scanner parameters. Therefore, a phantom was fabricated to provide a controllable
range of attenuations up to e8 to achieve the desired signal
level dynamic range. It consists of a series of attenuating
polymethyl methacrylate PMMA stacked cylinders with diameters of 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, and 35.4 cm Fig. 3. These
phantoms also provided reasonable changes of x-ray spectrum due to beam hardening. The phantom could be positioned by fixtures to be nominally centered on and aligned
along the gantry axis, such that it is the only object present
within the scanner field of view, i.e., there is no patient table
or other extraneous structure present in the sinogram. This
allows parametric fitting of sinogram profiles with fairly
simple analytic functions to estimate a mean profile, which
can be used to extract a pdf from measurements.
To determine the bowtie filter attenuation profile, scans
were performed with an open gantry only air attenuation at
various mAs levels. Both head and body scan protocols were
used, because different bowtie filters are employed for each
type of scan. Analyzing the variance present in open air provides an estimate of relative intensity-variation change
across the fan beam.
With approval of our institutions Human Studies Committee, raw data from scans of patients representing a range
of sizes were collected. These were analyzed to determine
the range of attenuations encountered in clinical operations.
A comparison of measured pdfs with theoretical predictions requires a source spectrum, meaning the output from
Xcomp5 must be filtered with appropriate scanner materials.
Medical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

FIG. 4. Measured profiles of an open gantry scan Sensation 16, 50 mAs.

a Mean transmittance for each detector over one revolution. b Variance
of transmittance across fan beam, which is proportional to the inverse of the
bowtie filter transmittance.

The exact form of beam filtration for each scanner was not
known, but could include inherent tube filtration, bowtie filters, and gantry shroud encasements. However, physical
specifications for each scanner model are reported by the
manufacturer or governmental agencies e.g., ImPACT, UK,
http://www.impactscan.org/, and QC measurements are performed locally on each device, including the beam quality
HVL and air kerma. In this study, the specified HVL and
air kerma for a device were used as a goal for adjusting the
filtration and the output of Xcomp5, and the resulting spectrum is used in the calculations as the incident spectrum
Fig. 1. As will be shown in the analysis, due to the central
limit theorem, the absolute accuracy of the spectrum is not
essential to the conclusions presented here.
C. Analysis methods

Techniques were developed to extract pertinent statistics

from experimental measurements, including determination of
the bowtie filter flux profile and computation of pdfs and
their moments for various flux levels.
1. Bowtie filter profile
A scan of an empty gantry produces a sinogram with essentially a constant, near-zero value of measured attenuation
across the fan beam, because the scanner has been calibrated
to indicate a uniform mean attenuation in air Fig. 4a. In
fact, some negative values of attenuation are present, since
the attenuation references a mean flux value but there can be
fluctuations above that amount, producing small negative attenuation values. However, examination of fluctuations in
the signal across the field of view reveals a detectordependent variance, indicative of an underlying variation in
flux level across the fan beam Fig. 4b. The inverse of the
variance of the transmission signal negative exponential of

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the attenuation is the NEQ since the mean of the unattenuated signal is nominally 1.0. Because analysis of the excess
noise due to spectrum shift bowtie-filter beam hardening
indicates only small changes in variance dependence, the
NEQ can be used as an estimate of the flux level.
For sinograms, there are typically between 1050 and 2320
gantry steps per revolution, so reasonable accuracy was obtained by using data from one rotation. Once the variance
profile for the detectors has been calculated, the resulting
profile was fit to an eighth-order polynomial and this fitprofile function was used to estimate the relative flux level
for analyzing detection statistics or in noise synthesis.
2. Cylinder phantom profiles
To measure the distribution of sinogram fluctuations about
a range of mean values, measured sinogram profiles for
simple cylindrical phantoms were fit to an expected meanvalue profile, and the statistical distribution of detector readings was approximated by the histogram of the fit residuals.33
These histograms were used to generate pdfs and their moments for different signal levels.
When scanned, the PMMA cylinders were centered and
aligned precisely but not perfectly. Ideally for a monoenergetic beam, their profile would be the fan-beam projection of
a circle, described by
PD = 2R2 L2sin2D D0,

10

where D is the angular detector position, D0 represents the

projected center of the cylinder, R is the radius of the cylinder, L is the distance from the source to the center of the
cylinder, and 2R is the maximum attenuation through the
cylinder center. However, real effects present in the scans
include mis-positioning of the disk center, misalignment of
the cylinder axis to scanner axis resulting in partial volume
effects at the edges, beam-hardening corrections to attenuation values, and fluctuations of the baseline tube current. To
perform the noise analysis, an accurate estimate of the mean
profile was needed rather than a conformance to an ideal
phantom model. Therefore, a parametric function was fit to
the attenuation profile PD using the form
PD = K + A1 C sin2D D0 + TD D0,

11

where K represents a baseline offset, A scales the attenuation,

C represents fan-beam projection of a cylinder radius, and T
allows an asymmetric linear term in the profile.
This includes possible effects of baseline variation, skewness due to misalignment, and displacement of the center of
the disk relative to the isocenter. A Nelder-Mead simplex
method, the MATLAB Mathworks, Natick, MA function
fminsearch, was used to optimize parameters of the fit. A plot
of measured cylinder attenuation 35.4 cm PMMA and parametrized fit for a reference cylinder profile with 25 mAs
exposure from a 16-row scanner is shown in Fig. 5, displaying excellent visual agreement. These fits could also be compared with a spectral-computed attenuation function to
evaluate the magnitude of the presumed beam-hardening correction.
Medical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

FIG. 5. Plot of measured cylinder attenuation and parametrized fit of cylinder profile. Data from 16-row scanner, with 25 mAs exposure.

The above method is susceptible to systematic errors

caused by the steep gradients that occur at the edges of the
cylinders.33 Even small errors in the estimation of the position Do of the cylinder translate into a magnified error variance in the value of the truth profile with a gain proportional to dP / dD2, which diverges near cylinder edges.
Therefore values in the region of edges are discounted in the
measurement analysis.
The attenuation values for the measured and reference
sinograms, which include the calibration performed to remove intensity variation introduced by the bowtie filter, were
adjusted to reflect the actual measured intensity by adding
the fitted bowtie filter attenuation profile to both sinograms.
The analysis proceeded as follows. First, the reference
truth sinogram is examined to determine the maximum and
minimum attenuation values present, then that range is divided into roughly 1000 attenuation bins. Second, the maximum and minimum most negative difference between the
reference and measured sinogram is determined for measurements associated with each of the reference bins established
in step 1. This difference range is then divided into roughly
500 bins. The scaling factor for the range of differences is
saved for all reference attenuation bins. The result is a twodimensional matrix, with indices for reference truth attenuation and difference of measurement from truth.
Third, for each detector measurement having sinogram
coordinates of detector position and gantry step, the truth
attenuation index was determined as the reference profile attenuation, and the measured fluctuation index was determined as the difference between the measured fluctuation
and the reference profile value described above. The appropriate histogram table bin was then incremented, ultimately
generating a record of fluctuations corresponding to any
given attenuation value Fig. 6. From this histogram matrix,
the attenuation values were converted to linear transmittance
and frequencies of occurrence were calculated to create a
pdf. One revolution of a sinogram has on the order of 1

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Whiting et al.: Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray CT

FIG. 6. Histogram of fluctuations about fitted profile for an attenuation bin

0.008 wide centered on 6.9, from 35.4 cm cylinder, with 25 mAs scan
on 16-row scanner.

106 total measurements but the number of measurements

contributing to a given attenuation level varied depending on
the phantom shape. For high attenuations located near the
flat center of the cylinder, there might be 10 000 measurements for a 35.4-cm cylinder, falling off to 500 measurements at attenuations corresponding to the steep sides of the
cylinder.
Once pdfs are available, cumulants mean, variance,
skewness, and kurtosis could be calculated for measurements and compared to arbitrary theoretical models.
III. RESULTS
Measurements were performed on a variety of CT scanners, all of which displayed similar characteristics. Results
presented below will be for a 16-row scanner, unless otherwise noted. For theoretical modeling, an effective beam filtration of 12 mm Al resulted in a HVL of 8.8 mm Al and an
air kerma of 112 Gy/mAs, in reasonable agreement with
reported values from the manufacturer34 HVL 8.8 mm Al
or Impact Ref. 35 CTDIair150 Gy/ mAs. In this example, the unattenuated photon flux at the detector is 1.0
106 / mAs mm2, resulting in an unattenuated quanta count
per measurement of 1700/mA, with an incident spectrum
having an average energy of 66.1 keV shown in Fig. 1.

3297

FIG. 7. Plot of attenuation vs thickness for PMMA cylinders scanned on

single row, four-row, and 16-row scanners. System calibration results fit a
linear relationship, with an attenuation coefficient of 0.218/cm, demonstrating good beam-hardening correction. Also plotted are the theoretical attenuations of energy-integrating model and quantum-counting model.

compensation for beam hardening for waterlike materials

such as PMMA. The effective beam-hardening polynomial
correction was estimated by fitting the measurements to a
theoretical calculation based on energy spectrum, with a quadratic polynomial providing excellent linearity, Acorr = Ameas
2
+ cAmeas
where c 0.04.
This correction will introduce an increase in noise variance proportional to the square of the slope of the attenuation
curve Acorr / Ameas2 = 1 + 2cAmeas2, which is estimated to
be on the order of 5% for these scans. However, the contrastto-noise ratio for small signals will be unaffected, because
both signal and noise will be equally modified. Theoretical
attenuation curves for spectra with different types of detector
mechanisms were calculated Fig. 7. Signal levels of an
energy-integrating detector remain higher less attenuating
for increasing thickness compared to counter models, leading
to an underestimate of the variance for corrected scans relative to direct measurements.

B. Fan-beam profile
A. Attenuation linearity

The measured attenuation values for PMMA cylinders

were plotted versus their diameter in Fig. 7, demonstrating a
linear dependence on diameter. Also plotted is the attenuation calculated from the assumed spectrum for both energyintegrating and quanta-counting models, which displays nonlinearity due to beam-hardening effects. Vendors apply a
polynomial beam-hardening correction, derived from calibration scans, to the measured attenuations to compensate for
this nonlinearity. The linearity of measured signal versus
phantom thickness for the three scanners indicates accurate
Medical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

Fan-beam profiles were measured for various scanners,

using open gantry air scans Fig. 8. No significant variation
of the fan-beam profile as a function of individual row position in the multirow scanners was found. Flux ratios from
center to edge varied from 6 to 10 in the scanners. While the
bowtie materials are not known, they are typically composed
of materials like Teflon or titanium. The above attenuation
factors correspond to an amount of material e.g., 10 mm
Teflon or 6 mm Ti that would harden the incident beam
effective energy from 65 keV at the isocenter to 75 keV at
the periphery of the fan beam.

3298

Whiting et al.: Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray CT

3298

FIG. 9. Patient attenuation sinogram profiles for an adult head scan, abdominal scan, and pelvic scan in patient with bilateral hip implant. Note that
the latter scan demonstrates the range of maximum attenuations observed
clinically.

FIG. 8. Fan-beam flux profiles from various scanner models.

C. Flux levels

Quanta flux ID, the mean number of quanta per detector

measurement, plays a key role in determining signal statistics
for clinical scans. Flux levels were calculated at the central
ray for open gantry scans and for simple attenuation conditions. For example, summary statistics for theoretically calculated pdfs for a 25-mAs scan is shown in Table I. For
modern scanners, the flux level ranges from 60 000 to over
1 106 quanta per measurement in air attenuation, and is
usually greater than 30 at the maximum attenuation for scans
of normal-sized adults. Examination of representative patient
scans revealed maximum attenuations of 4 for head scans
and 68 for body scans for normal-sized adult patients, with
attenuations reaching as high as 15 for large patients or patients with prosthetic implants. A sample of patient attenuation profiles is shown in Fig. 9. For very attenuating patients, then, the NEQ could reach single digits. Note that for
the single-row scanners, under high attenuation conditions
the collimation could be increased by an order of magnitude
to increase SNR, and for multirow scanners detector rows

can be combined to improve the SNR of data. Clinical protocols are usually adjusted to limit the amount of noise
present at the expense of spatial resolution.

D. Pdf forms

Pdfs were calculated for measurements from cylinder

phantoms and compared to pdfs generated from theoretical
spectra. In both cases, cumulants were also calculated. Because of uncertainties in absolute flux magnitude, the measured pdfs were compared to theoretical pdfs at matched
NEQ Fig. 10. Table I shows the comparison of moments,
indicating that the cumulant moments become Gaussian-like
rather quickly Q0 20. Interestingly, the excess variance
changes from 1.08 to 1.04 over a range of thickness from 0
to 30 cm, indicating that there are only minor differences in
noise properties due to spectral changes for attenuated sig-

TABLE I. Summary statistics for theoretically calculated pdfs. The columns are: diameter of cylinder phantom, effective energy of exit spectrum, excess
factors for cumulants variance, skewness, and kurtosis relative to Poisson distribution for a monoenergetic source, the total flux, and absolute value of NEQ,
skew, and kurtosis for a 25-mAs scan.

Diameter
cm

Mean
energy
keV

Excess
variance

Excess
skew

Excess
kurtosis

Qo

NEQ

Skew

Kurtosis

0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35.4

66.6
69.0
71.2
73.2
75.2
77.0
78.7
80.4

1.082
1.076
1.071
1.067
1.063
1.060
1.057
1.053

1.257
1.238
1.222
1.207
1.195
1.183
1.172
1.161

1.558
1.510
1.471
1.437
1.407
1.380
1.354
1.329

46982.8
15974.1
5534.6
1945.1
695.3
249.0
89.3
32.9

43442.2
14847.2
5166.7
1822.8
653.9
234.9
84.5
31.2

6.66E-10
5.61E-09
4.58E-08
3.63E-07
2.79E-06
2.14E-05
1.64E-04
1.19E-03

1.90E-14
4.61E-13
1.07E-11
2.37E-10
5.03E-09
1.06E-07
2.25E-06
4.36E-05

Medical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

3299

Whiting et al.: Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray CT

FIG. 10. Measured and calculated pdfs, 35.4-cm-diam cylinder in 16-row

scanner, 50 mA, 0.5 sec. rotation time, incident quanta 1.7 105, transmission level of 4.5 104, number of measurements= 145 163. Axes have
been scaled to arbitrary units. The NEQ, relative skewness, and relative
kurtosis were 8.3, 0.25, 0.19 for the measured data and 8.3, 0.36, 0.10 for
the theoretical data, respectively. For reference, the corresponding simple
Poisson distribution mean= 4.4, due to beam-hardening correction is
shown.

nals over this range. As the beam becomes harder, the

narrowing of the spectrum contributes relatively less excess
noise.
Plotting the transmittance variance versus the transmittance mean reveals characteristics of noise mechanisms36
Fig. 11. The relationship is nominally linear. A nonzero
intercept indicates the presence of a baseline system noise.

FIG. 11. Plot of variance vs transmittance for single-row scanner upper

and four-row scanner lower at low-flux conditions. The variance is linear
with transmittance, with a slope equal to the inverse NEQ. The intercept
divided by the slope squared is equal to the dark current count, in this case
505 quanta equivalent for the older single-row scanner design and 29 quanta
for the newer four-row design.
Medical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

3299

FIG. 12. Plot of measured pdf for single-row scanner for mean transmission
4.45 104, corresponding to region in Fig. 11 with excess system noise.
The calculated primary beam NEQ is 32 but the measured NEQ is 2.5, due
to high system noise.

This is usually negligible in most cases, but in some older

single-row scanner designs it was found to be significant
under low-dose conditions Figs. 11 and 12.
The presence of quantization due to analog-to-digital converters can be seen by examining the distribution of measurements at low levels. In Fig. 13, the quantization levels
are clearly seen, although the contribution to the total variance is a minimal amount. Note that quantization at this level
5 105 would blur the pdfs at low count levels so that
fine features, such as characteristic radiation peaks, would

FIG. 13. Plots of measured signals for six central detectors over one gantry
revolution, at low-flux level 50 mAs in four row scanner in 35.4-cm-diam
cylinder phantom. The measurements cluster at quantization levels corresponding to a step size of 5 105. Note that the overall range of measurements is large 103 relative to the quantization steps, so that the contribution of quantization to total variance is not significant.

3300

Whiting et al.: Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray CT

3300

not be resolved. Even for a well-designed ADC, the resolution limit is likely to be several hundred keV and will prevent the detection of individual quanta.
IV. DISCUSSION
The methods and measurements presented above allow a
comparison between actual CT scanner data, the conventional monoenergetic-counter model, and a more accurate
energy-integrating model. The first noticeable observation is
that real CT data distributions consist of continuous rather
than discrete values, as is correctly predicted by the energyintegrating model. To first order, the variance of actual signal
measurements is proportional to the mean of the signal for
all cases. Theoretical models predict that the absolute variance of an ideal energy integrator would be 2%10% higher
than that of an ideal counting detector over the range of
clinical signals, being a function of object attenuation and
beam spectrum, which is consistent with measurements to
within our experimental accuracy. In many applications the
counter model can be simply rescaled to the data as an effective NEQ, so the actual residual error due to such spectral
variation could be limited to only a few percent. Current
clinical CT protocols normally produce measurements with
fairly high minimum NEQ, in excess of 30. Under these
conditions, measurements are normally distributed and
choice of a statistical model is not critical. As the flux to the
detector decreases, however, the forms of the distribution
functions become quite different and need to be accounted
for.
A second observation of CT signal statistics is the dominant role that nonuniform beam flux has on signal levels. To
minimize radiation risk to the patient, CT scanners are designed to reduce the flux levels in certain areas of the fanbeam measurements by substantial amounts, using bowtie
filters or tube current modulation. With proper calibration,
this will leave the means of attenuation measurements unaffected but can strongly influence noise properties.
A third influence on CT signal statistics comes from data
conditioning, such as calibrating individual detector measurements or compensating for polyenergetic beamhardening nonlinearities. This must be done very accurately
to avoid visual artifacts in the image, but can result in significant modification of statistical properties of noise. However, the effect on small-signal contrast-to-noise ratio is not
significant, as both signal and noise are propagated through
the processing.
The overall trends in image noise are summarized in Fig.
14, which presents the relative variance ratio of variance to
that of an ideal monoenergetic counter as a function of reported attenuation. At very low or very high attenuations,
effects such as quantization or data conditioning will significantly effect the variance of signals, depending on scanner
design and operating parameters. In mid-attenuation regions,
the Compound Poisson statistics of energy-integrating detection contribute to an increase in variance of less than 10%
relative to ideal-counter detection, which is on the order of
preprocessing contributions. The dominant determinate of
Medical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

FIG. 14. Plot of ratio of noise variance of total system model including
energy integrating excess noise, quantization noise in ADC and log data,
system noise, beam-hardening corrections, variation in electronic gain and
offset, and bowtie filter relative to conventional counter model monoenergetic, uniform flux, no additional noise sources as a function of corrected
attenuation. The dashed line represents ideal variance reference unity,
lower curve is for central ray minimum bowtie attenuation, and upper
curve is for bowtie transmittance of 0.25. Parameters used include 170 000
quanta incident per measurement, ADC quantization of 105 and log quantization of 4.4 104, electronic noise of 5 quanta, gain and offset accuracy
of 0.14%, and quadratic beam-hardening correction. At high-flux levels low
attenuation in central ray, excess noise is dominated by quantization and
compensation error; at low flux, system noise and beam-hardening corrections contribute to increases; at mid-range flux levels, polyenergetic excess
noise increases the relative variance. In all cases, the flux levels produced by
the bowtie filter dominate the relative variance ratio.

noise level is the nonuniform both temporal and spatial flux

in the fan beam. Note that the importance of any of these
effects in a reconstructed image may be actually quite small,
e.g., for low attenuation regions with SNR 103, a doubling
of the variance will not lead to an observable increase in
noise texture.
The implications of above signal properties for statistical
reconstruction algorithms need to be examined. Methods to
determine unbiased mean estimates are clearly important and
current approaches work well in normal situations. To get
proper accounting of noise effects, assumptions of uniform
flux levels must be replaced by time- and space-varying
beam properties. Particularly at low-flux levels, more exact
pdfs and other noise sources must be adopted.
For dose reduction simulation, noise synthesis can be a
useful tool if it accurately reproduces actual scan imagery.
This implies including beam intensity nonuniformities and
accurate pdfs, particularly at low-flux counts. Using Gaussian or Poisson noise generators that match moments of accurate models may be acceptable, but this should be validated
for specific diagnostic tasks. This is a topic of ongoing research and will be reported elsewhere.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This work was supported by the Mallinckrodt Institute of
Radiology and grants from the NIH Grant No. NIH/RAD

3301

Whiting et al.: Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray CT

R01CA75371-05A1 J.F.W. and Grant No. NIH/NCI R21

CA95408-01 B.R.W.. Special thanks go to Steven Don,
M.D. and David Politte, D.Sc. for their helpful comments on
this manuscript, and to one of the reviewers for raising questions about the role of data conditioning on signal statistics.

APPENDIX A: DERIVATION OF COMPOUND

POISSON PDF
Equation 5 was derived by manipulating the properties
of the characteristic function for a Poisson process.15 The
characteristic function for the Poisson process is the Fourier
transform of Eq. 4, i.e.,
A1

Cf, = expeif 1,

where is the mean and f is its complementary variable.

For an energy-integrating process, with each quantum
weighted by its energy contribution GE, the argument of the
characteristic function is modified to f = GEf. The characteristic function of a process representing a weighted sum of
individual processes is given by the product of the individual
characteristic functions with a modified argument,37

kVp

Q0EeiGEf 1dE .

Cf, = exp

A2

The pdf for the measured signal is the Fourier transform of

A2. This can be simplified in the following way. The integral in A2 can be separated into two terms with differing
energy dependence,

kVp

Q0EeiGEf 1 dE

exp

kVp

Q0EdE

= exp

Q0EeiGEf dE

A3

where QT is the mean total number of measured quanta and

QGf is the scaled Fourier transform of the x-ray spectra.
The pdf of the signal is found by a series expansion of the
exponential
pdfS =

Here k represents the result of applying the convolution

operator k times to the detected spectrum. While Eq. A4 is
compact, its evaluation may involve extended computations
and interpreting its form may not be initially obvious.
An intuitive explanation of Eq. A4 can be seen from the
following perspective. The x-ray spectrum E represents
the probability that a given individual x ray will have a particular energy, i.e., it is the probability density function, for
an energy given repeated measurements of exactly one x-ray
quantum. The pdf for total energies corresponding to the
measurement of exactly two quanta is given by the convolution of the spectrum with itself. By extension, the pdf for the
energy distribution of exactly N quanta is just the N-fold
convolution of the spectrum. The generation of an x ray of a
particular energy is an independent, infrequent event, so it
can be modeled as a Poisson process.6 Because the combination of Poisson processes results in the addition of the
mean, the probability of measuring exactly N quanta of all
energies, given a mean number of total quanta of all energies, is given by Ne / N!. Hence the overall pdf for the
measured signal energies is just the superposition of the pdf
for each integer number of quanta times the probability of
that number of quanta occurring. From the central limit theorem, the effective spectrum becomes progressively more normal Gaussian due to individual pdfs becoming more
Gaussian with increasing number of convolutions and the
distribution of the number of quanta around the mean becomes more normal itself. Hence the common approximation
of Gaussian statistics is appropriate, although the details of
the parameters of the function depend on the spectrum and
mean signal Fig. 2.
APPENDIX B: VARIANCE CONTRIBUTIONS OF
SIGNAL CONDITIONING

kVp

= exp QT + QGf,

3301

Equations 3a and 3b represent the conditioning operations performed on measurements to generate data appropriate for image reconstruction. Errors or variability in the coefficients of these operations could possibly influence the
variance in the recorded signals. To analyze this effect, assuming a linear system model,38 the measurement attenuation is restated by noting that in the numerator b
aS0, and
the gain and offset coefficients can be combined into one
term,

Am = log

eiSf eQT+QGfdf

B1

= eQT

=e

QT

aS0 + b
aS0
S0
log
= log
.
aSm + b
aSm + b
Sm + b/a

k=0

= eQT

k=0

eiSf

k=0

QGfk
df
k!

The contribution to the variance A2 due to the variance

m
in the unattenuated reference signal S2 and variance in the
0
electronic gain/offset can be calculated as follows:

eiSf QGfkdf
A2 S0
m

k!
Q0S/Gk
.
k!

Medical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

A4

2
Am 2 2 S0 S20T2
=
S0 = 2 = 2 = T2 ,
S0
S0
S0

B2

where T2 is the variance of reference signal transformed to a

transmittance. This variance can be established by performing an air scan, summing the transmittance across all detec-

3302

Whiting et al.: Properties of preprocessed sinogram data in x-ray CT

tor measurements at each gantry position, and computing the

standard deviation of the detector sum. This was found to be
on the order of a 0.3% fluctuation, corresponding to T2
105.
The contribution to A2 from the electronic term in the
m
denominator is
A2 b/a =
m

Am
b/a

2
2
b/a
=

2
b/a
.
Sm + b/a2

B3

In order to avoid the generation of visual artifacts in reconstructed images, the electronic factors must be properly
matched to within a fractional signal error 0.0015Sm
+ b / a, limiting the variance to
A2 b/a =
m

2
b/a
Sm + b/a2
=
0.00152 = 2 106 .
Sm + b/a2 Sm + b/a2

B4
As a point of reference, the contribution to
quantum noise is
A2 QN
m

A2
m

from

S0
Am 2 2
=
Sm =
Sm
Sm + b/a2
2

E2
E + b/a

1
b/a
1+
E

2,

B5
where is the mean number of quanta and E is the average
energy of the quanta. Therefore, the quantum noise variance
is inversely proportional to the number of quanta, except
when the system noise becomes comparable to the signal
level. The contributions to measurement variance due to data
conditioning will thus be small, except for very large signals
where 1 Ameas + A2 b/a or very small signals
m
E
b / a.
Application of a beam-hardening correction Eq. 3a
will also affect the variance properties of the processed signal, computed as

A2 corr =
=

Acorr 2 2
Ameas
Ameas
2
Ameas + cAmeas

Ameas

= 1 + 2cAmeas2A2

meas

2
Ameas

B6

Note that the expected variance for a given attenuation is

given by A2 = expA, so the ratio of the variance of the
corrected attenuation to the variance of the measured attenuation is given by

A2 corr

A2 meas

expAmeas
expAmeas
=
2
expAcorr expAmeas + cAmeas

2
,
= exp cAmeas

B7

i.e., the variance of the corrected signal is less than the exMedical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 9, September 2006

3302

pected value, due to the fact that beam hardening lessens the
attenuation of the beam signal. In total, the relative attenua2
tion signal variance will differ by the amount corr

2
= 1 + 2cAmeas2expcAmeas
, shown in Fig. 14.
a

Electronic mail: whitingb@wustl.edu

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