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Microbubbles as a scattering contrast agent for grating-based x-ray dark-field imaging

Velroyen, A. ; Bech, Martin LU orcid ; Malecki, A. ; Tapfer, A. ; Yaroshenko, A. ; Ingrisch, M. ; Cyran, C. C. ; Auweter, S. D. ; Nikolaou, K. and Reiser, M. , et al. (2013) In Physics in Medicine and Biology 58(4). p.37-46
Abstract
In clinically established-absorption-based-biomedical x-ray imaging, contrast agents with high atomic numbers (e.g. iodine) are commonly used for contrast enhancement. The development of novel x-ray contrast modalities such as phase contrast and dark-field contrast opens up the possible use of alternative contrast media in x-ray imaging. We investigate using ultrasound contrast agents, which unlike iodine-based contrast agents can also be administered to patients with renal impairment and thyroid dysfunction, for application with a recently developed novel x-ray dark-field imaging modality. To produce contrast from these microbubble-based contrast agents, our method exploits ultra-small-angle coherent x-ray scattering. Such scattering... (More)
In clinically established-absorption-based-biomedical x-ray imaging, contrast agents with high atomic numbers (e.g. iodine) are commonly used for contrast enhancement. The development of novel x-ray contrast modalities such as phase contrast and dark-field contrast opens up the possible use of alternative contrast media in x-ray imaging. We investigate using ultrasound contrast agents, which unlike iodine-based contrast agents can also be administered to patients with renal impairment and thyroid dysfunction, for application with a recently developed novel x-ray dark-field imaging modality. To produce contrast from these microbubble-based contrast agents, our method exploits ultra-small-angle coherent x-ray scattering. Such scattering dark-field x-ray images can be obtained with a grating-based x-ray imaging setup, together with refraction-based differential phase-contrast and the conventional attenuation contrast images. In this work we specifically show that ultrasound contrast agents based on microbubbles can be used to produce strongly enhanced dark-field contrast, with superior contrast-to-noise ratio compared to the attenuation signal. We also demonstrate that this method works well with an x-ray tube-based setup and that the relative contrast gain even increases when the pixel size is increased from tenths of microns to clinically compatible detector resolutions about up to a millimetre. (Less)
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organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Physics in Medicine and Biology
volume
58
issue
4
pages
37 - 46
publisher
IOP Publishing
external identifiers
  • wos:000314396800001
  • scopus:84873686874
  • pmid:23369954
ISSN
1361-6560
DOI
10.1088/0031-9155/58/4/N37
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
30f851fa-4562-4206-8dca-a67e8f17741b (old id 3590117)
alternative location
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23369954
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 11:07:42
date last changed
2022-02-18 00:21:27
@article{30f851fa-4562-4206-8dca-a67e8f17741b,
  abstract     = {{In clinically established-absorption-based-biomedical x-ray imaging, contrast agents with high atomic numbers (e.g. iodine) are commonly used for contrast enhancement. The development of novel x-ray contrast modalities such as phase contrast and dark-field contrast opens up the possible use of alternative contrast media in x-ray imaging. We investigate using ultrasound contrast agents, which unlike iodine-based contrast agents can also be administered to patients with renal impairment and thyroid dysfunction, for application with a recently developed novel x-ray dark-field imaging modality. To produce contrast from these microbubble-based contrast agents, our method exploits ultra-small-angle coherent x-ray scattering. Such scattering dark-field x-ray images can be obtained with a grating-based x-ray imaging setup, together with refraction-based differential phase-contrast and the conventional attenuation contrast images. In this work we specifically show that ultrasound contrast agents based on microbubbles can be used to produce strongly enhanced dark-field contrast, with superior contrast-to-noise ratio compared to the attenuation signal. We also demonstrate that this method works well with an x-ray tube-based setup and that the relative contrast gain even increases when the pixel size is increased from tenths of microns to clinically compatible detector resolutions about up to a millimetre.}},
  author       = {{Velroyen, A. and Bech, Martin and Malecki, A. and Tapfer, A. and Yaroshenko, A. and Ingrisch, M. and Cyran, C. C. and Auweter, S. D. and Nikolaou, K. and Reiser, M. and Pfeiffer, F.}},
  issn         = {{1361-6560}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{4}},
  pages        = {{37--46}},
  publisher    = {{IOP Publishing}},
  series       = {{Physics in Medicine and Biology}},
  title        = {{Microbubbles as a scattering contrast agent for grating-based x-ray dark-field imaging}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/0031-9155/58/4/N37}},
  doi          = {{10.1088/0031-9155/58/4/N37}},
  volume       = {{58}},
  year         = {{2013}},
}