General Electric Company

Jean-Pierre J Georges

Gary S Keyes

Charles D Greskovich

Dominic A Cusano

Frank A DiBianca

Dennis G DallaPiazza

William H Wesbey

An improved scintillator for a solid state radiation detector useful in CT (computed tomography), DR (digital radiography), and related technologies. The scintillator, rather than being grown as a single crystal, is formed by means of hot pressing or sintering, as a polycrystalline ceramic. Rare earth oxides doped with rare earth activators are selected to yield a cubic crystal structure of high density and transmittance, which satisfies radiation detector requirements better than crystals utilized heretofore.

Rare earth ceramic scintillator

Image frames produced consecutively with x-ray beams having different spectral bands or average energy levels are converted to analog video signals and then to digital data. The digital data for an image at one energy is stored in a memory and the ensuing data for the next image is subtracted from the stored data in an alternate or cyclic fashion. The resulting difference data is converted to analog video signals and displayed on a television monitor at standard frame rates. The same system can be used to store a digitized data mask frame and the digital data for ensuing frames can be subtracted from the mask. In some embodiments a buffer is used to allow removal of data from memory without having the data from a preceding frame overwritten by ensuing frames. Other embodiments use more than one memory and, in some cases, buffers to allow manipulating the data so snapshot, integrated and continuous or real-time subtraction images can be displayed individually on a single monitor or jointly on additional monitors.

Subtraction fluoroscopy method and apparatus

An x-ray source projects successive high and low energy x-ray beam pulses through a body and the resultant x-ray images are converted to optical images. Two image pick-up devices such as TV cameras that have synchronously operated shutters receive the alternate images and convert them to corresponding analog video signals. In some embodiments, the analog signals are converted to a matrix of digital pixel signals that are variously processed and subtracted and converted to signals for driving a TV monitor display and analog storage devices. In other embodiments the signals are processed and subtracted in analog form for display. The high and low energy pulses can follow each other immediately so good registration between subtracted images is obtainable even though the anatomy is in motion. The energy levels of the x-ray pulses are chosen to maximize the difference in attenuation between the anatomical structure which is to be subtracted out and that which remains.

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Waukesha, WI, United States of America

Jean-Pierre J Georges