Division of Imaging, Diagnostics and Software Reliability, Office of Science and Engineering Laboratories, CDRH/FDA, Silver Spring, Maryland, United States of America.
Radiological Physics Division, The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2023 Jun 8;18(6):e0270387. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0270387. eCollection 2023.
We present an upgraded version of the Photon Counting Toolkit (PcTK), a freely available by request MATLAB tool for the simulation of semiconductor-based photon counting detectors (PCD), which has been extended and validated to account for gallium arsenide (GaAs)-based PCD(s). The modified PcTK version was validated by performing simulations and acquiring experimental data for three different cases. The LAMBDA 60 K module planar detector (X-Spectrum GmbH, Germany) based on the Medipix3 ASIC technology was used in all cases. This detector has a 500-μm thick GaAs sensor and a 256 × 256-pixel array with 55 μm pixel size. The first validation was a comparison between simulated and measured spectra from a 109Cd radionuclide source. In the second validation study, experimental measurements and simulations of mammography spectra were generated to observe the performance of the GaAs version of the PcTK with polychromatic radiation used in conventional x-ray imaging systems. The third validation study used single event analysis to validate the spatio-energetic model of the extended PcTK version. Overall, the software provided a good agreement between simulated and experimental data, validating the accuracy of the GaAs model. The software could be an attractive tool for accurate simulation of breast imaging modalities relying on photon counting detectors and therefore could assist in their characterization and optimization.
我们提出了光子计数工具包（PcTK）的升级版本，这是一个免费提供的请求 MATLAB 工具，用于模拟基于半导体的光子计数探测器（PCD），该工具已经扩展和验证，可以用于基于砷化镓（GaAs）的 PCD(s)。修改后的 PcTK 版本通过对三种不同情况进行模拟和获取实验数据进行了验证。在所有情况下都使用了基于 Medipix3 ASIC 技术的 LAMBDA 60 K 模块平面探测器（X-Spectrum GmbH，德国）。该探测器具有 500-μm 厚的 GaAs 传感器和 256×256 像素阵列，像素尺寸为 55 μm。第一个验证是模拟和测量 109Cd 放射性核素源的光谱之间的比较。在第二个验证研究中，生成了乳房 X 光摄影光谱的实验测量和模拟，以观察在传统 X 射线成像系统中使用的多色辐射的 GaAs 版本的 PcTK 的性能。第三个验证研究使用单事件分析来验证扩展 PcTK 版本的空间能量模型。总的来说，该软件在模拟和实验数据之间提供了很好的一致性，验证了 GaAs 模型的准确性。该软件可能是一种有吸引力的工具，可用于基于光子计数探测器的乳房成像模式的精确模拟，因此可以帮助对其进行表征和优化。
