TY - JOUR
T1 - Clinical applications of photon counting detector CT
AU - McCollough, Cynthia H.
AU - Rajendran, Kishore
AU - Baffour, Francis I.
AU - Diehn, Felix E.
AU - Ferrero, Andrea
AU - Glazebrook, Katrina N.
AU - Horst, Kelly K.
AU - Johnson, Tucker F.
AU - Leng, Shuai
AU - Mileto, Achille
AU - Rajiah, Prabhakar Shantha
AU - Schmidt, Bernhard
AU - Yu, Lifeng
AU - Flohr, Thomas G.
AU - Fletcher, Joel G.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to European Society of Radiology.
PY - 2023/8
Y1 - 2023/8
N2 - Abstract: The X-ray detector is a fundamental component of a CT system that determines the image quality and dose efficiency. Until the approval of the first clinical photon-counting-detector (PCD) system in 2021, all clinical CT scanners used scintillating detectors, which do not capture information about individual photons in the two-step detection process. In contrast, PCDs use a one-step process whereby X-ray energy is converted directly into an electrical signal. This preserves information about individual photons such that the numbers of X-ray in different energy ranges can be counted. Primary advantages of PCDs include the absence of electronic noise, improved radiation dose efficiency, increased iodine signal and the ability to use lower doses of iodinated contrast material, and better spatial resolution. PCDs with more than one energy threshold can sort the detected photons into two or more energy bins, making energy-resolved information available for all acquisitions. This allows for material classification or quantitation tasks to be performed in conjunction with high spatial resolution, and in the case of dual-source CT, high pitch, or high temporal resolution acquisitions. Some of the most promising applications of PCD-CT involve imaging of anatomy where exquisite spatial resolution adds clinical value. These include imaging of the inner ear, bones, small blood vessels, heart, and lung. This review describes the clinical benefits observed to date and future directions for this technical advance in CT imaging. Key Points: • Beneficial characteristics of photon-counting detectors include the absence of electronic noise, increased iodine signal-to-noise ratio, improved spatial resolution, and full-time multi-energy imaging. • Promising applications of PCD-CT involve imaging of anatomy where exquisite spatial resolution adds clinical value and applications requiring multi-energy data simultaneous with high spatial and/or temporal resolution. • Future applications of PCD-CT technology may include extremely high spatial resolution tasks, such as the detection of breast micro-calcifications, and quantitative imaging of native tissue types and novel contrast agents.
AB - Abstract: The X-ray detector is a fundamental component of a CT system that determines the image quality and dose efficiency. Until the approval of the first clinical photon-counting-detector (PCD) system in 2021, all clinical CT scanners used scintillating detectors, which do not capture information about individual photons in the two-step detection process. In contrast, PCDs use a one-step process whereby X-ray energy is converted directly into an electrical signal. This preserves information about individual photons such that the numbers of X-ray in different energy ranges can be counted. Primary advantages of PCDs include the absence of electronic noise, improved radiation dose efficiency, increased iodine signal and the ability to use lower doses of iodinated contrast material, and better spatial resolution. PCDs with more than one energy threshold can sort the detected photons into two or more energy bins, making energy-resolved information available for all acquisitions. This allows for material classification or quantitation tasks to be performed in conjunction with high spatial resolution, and in the case of dual-source CT, high pitch, or high temporal resolution acquisitions. Some of the most promising applications of PCD-CT involve imaging of anatomy where exquisite spatial resolution adds clinical value. These include imaging of the inner ear, bones, small blood vessels, heart, and lung. This review describes the clinical benefits observed to date and future directions for this technical advance in CT imaging. Key Points: • Beneficial characteristics of photon-counting detectors include the absence of electronic noise, increased iodine signal-to-noise ratio, improved spatial resolution, and full-time multi-energy imaging. • Promising applications of PCD-CT involve imaging of anatomy where exquisite spatial resolution adds clinical value and applications requiring multi-energy data simultaneous with high spatial and/or temporal resolution. • Future applications of PCD-CT technology may include extremely high spatial resolution tasks, such as the detection of breast micro-calcifications, and quantitative imaging of native tissue types and novel contrast agents.
KW - Humans
KW - Iodine
KW - Photons
KW - Radiation dosage
KW - Tomography, X-ray computed
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U2 - 10.1007/s00330-023-09596-y
DO - 10.1007/s00330-023-09596-y
M3 - Review article
C2 - 37020069
AN - SCOPUS:85151513249
SN - 0938-7994
VL - 33
SP - 5309
EP - 5320
JO - European radiology
JF - European radiology
IS - 8
ER -