Spectral, Photon Counting Computed Tomography

The book is a comprehensive cover of the latest developments in the most prevalent imaging modality (X-ray Computed Tomography (CT)) in its latest incarnation: Spectral, Dual-Energy and Photon Counting CT. Disadvantages of the conventional single-energytechnique used by CT technology are that different materials cannot be distinguished and that the noise is larger. To address these problems, a novel spectral CT concept has been proposed. Spectral dual-energy CT (DE-CT) acquires two sets of spectral data and spectral Photon Counting CT (PC-CT) detects energy of x-ray photons to reveal additional material information of objects by using novel energy-sensitive, photon-counting detectors. The K-edge imaging may be a gateway for functional or molecular CT. The book covers detectors and electronics, image reconstruction methods, image quality assessments, a simulation tool, nanoparticle contrast agents, and clinical applications for spectral CT--