Preliminary investigation of a multiple-image radiography method

Conventional radiography seeks to produce, at each location in the image plane, a measure of the X-ray absorption of the object. In this paper, we present a method of determining a much more complete object description at each point, namely the intensity distribution (as a function of angle) of the emerging X-ray beam. From this distribution one can compute many different images, depicting the refraction, absorption, and scattering characteristics of the object. The method is based on acquisition of multiple X-ray images using monochromator and analyzer crystals, followed by a deconvolution operation (over angle) at each pixel. Parameters of the deconvolved angular intensity function are measured to obtain the various images of interest. We present experimental results obtained using X-rays produced by a synchrotron, along with simulated images showing the effect of noise in a hypothetical photon-limited imaging situation.

1. Introduction

Conventional radiographic imaging depicts only one physical parameter of the object: x-ray absorption. Other possibly informative effects such as refraction are not normally measured. An additional limitation of conventional radiography is the presence of scatter, which can obscure important image details.