X-Ray Diffraction Tomography

 Topic Introduction
o XRD used originally for measuring signal from single location on surface of a sample
o Typically needed to be crystalline – not great for biomedical
o Late 1980’s – ideas for imaging with XRD emerge, but limited by X-ray source
availability, prohibitive Ge sensor requirements, and poor computers
o Two key innovations improved prospects
 Growth of CPU and GPU performance, and computational imaging insights
 Development of detector arrays – efficient, multipixel spectroscopic arrays with
shot-noise-limited performance
 Applications
o Medicine/Biomedical
 Body fat, muscle, and bone have diffraction patterns that can be differentiated
by XRD
 Diffraction plot
 Y = Relative scatter intensity
 X = q (Momentum transfer, parameter related to X-ray energy and
scattering angle)
 Osteoporosis detection – bone imaging
 Detect decrease in bone mass before noticeable symptoms appear
 Detect mineral loss in bones
 Breast cancer imaging
 Able to detect presence of collagen in breast tissue, which is strongly
correlated with cancer
 Informing treatment for Kidney Stones
 XRD has excellent material discrimination ability
 Ability to measure numerous momentum transfer values also helps
 Different stones show different patterns – different treatments
 Brain Imaging
 XRD able to distinguish white and gray matter in brain better than
conventional CT for same radiation dose
 Liver Imaging
 Detection of fatty liver for transplant screening
 Blood Vessel plaque detection
 Detect buildup of plaque before heart attacks or similar complications
occur
o Limitations of XRD Imaging for medical applications
 Multiple scatter noise
 Monte Carlo simulation-based estimation of noise can help reduce
 Scan time
 Coded aperture techniques can help reduce this
  Introduction
o X-ray computed tomography (CT) is current standard, but cannot distinguish subtle
difference in molecular structure since it’s based on x-ray attenuation, which is
dependent on electron density
o X-ray coherent scattering signal is better than x-ray attenuation – able to detect
cancerous regions in tissue and explosives in security screening
o Fundamental coherent scattering imaging concept – combine x-ray diffraction
measurements with a projection setup similar to CT
o Potential implementation problems
 Scattering may not be isotropic – bones/teeth have ordering at molecular level
and explosives have crystalline structure  anisotropic scattering signature
 Intensity of diffracted X-rays is much less than transmitted beam – tradeoff
between high radiation dose and long acquisition time
 Principles
o Polycapillary collimators are used for direct tomography and collimate the detection
such that each pixel receives scattered light from a small region
 Limits collection efficiency
o Pencil beam angular dispersive XDT (AD-XDT)
 No collimation required w/ pencil beam illumination  improved collection
efficiency
 Better resolution
 Low source utilization efficiency
o Fan beam AD-XDT
 Illuminate plane of sample and reconstruct similar to pencil beam setup
 only collimate in horizontal direction, and collect diffracted photons from whole
line of illumination
 a sequence of 2D projects are measured while object is rotated
o Energy-Dispersive XDT
 Uses broadband source – no need for filtration  improved source efficiency
 Each detector row measures broadband diffracted photons in corresponding
energy channels (rather than single-energy diffraction at different diffraction
angles)

Summary

 X-ray diffraction provides material-specific fingerprint for medical diagnosis & anomaly
detection
 XRD + tomographic data acquisition = scattering profile of each point within extended object
 May be combined with fluorescence and absorption