The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 04, 2003
Filed:
May. 04, 2001
John A. Shepherd, Novato, CA (US);
Steven R. Cummings, Mill Valley, CA (US);
Karla Kerlikowske, San Alselmo, CA (US);
The Regents of the University of California, Oakland, CA (US);
Abstract
The present invention provides a radiation device that includes a device for retaining therein the body part in a uniform position. In addition, at least two reference materials that have attenuation characteristics are used and retained in the retaining device. The reference materials are being positioned for the comparative determination during a simultaneous irradiation of the body part and the reference materials. The attenuation characteristics of the reference materials are selected in correspondence to the attenuation characteristics of the body materials in the body part. A radiation device for simultaneously irradiating the body part and the reference materials is used to create attenuated beams. A detector is used to detect the attenuated beams as attenuated values. A calculating device is included for calculating the proportion of the body materials that define a particular body part of interest based on the attenuated values of the materials and the body part.