Elemental contrast imaging with a polychromatic laboratory x-ray source using energy-discriminating detectors

摘要

Determining the specific spatial distributions of elements within compound samples is of critical importance to a range of applied research fields. The usual approaches to obtaining elemental contrast involve measurement of the characteristic peaks associated with x-ray fluorescence or measuring the x-ray transmission as a function of energy. In the laboratory these measurements are challenging due to the polychromaticity and lack of tunability of the source. Here we demonstrate how newly developed, high-resolution, energy-discriminating area detector technology can be exploited to enhance elemental contrast. The detector we employ here is the Pixirad area detector which can simultaneously have up to four separate colour channels. We also discuss the potential of this new technology in the context of tomographic imaging of soft tissue.