TH‐CD‐207B‐05: Measurement of CT Bow‐Tie Profiles Using a Linear Array Detector

Purpose: To accurately measure CT bow‐tie profiles from various manufacturers and to provide non‐proprietary information for CT system modeling. Methods: A GOS‐based linear detector (0.8 mm per pixel and 51.2 cm in length) with a fast data sampling speed (0.24 ms/sample) was used to measure the relative profiles of bow‐tie filters from a collection of eight CT scanners by three different vendors, GE (LS Xtra, LS VCT, Discovery HD750), Siemens (Sensation 64, Edge, Flash, Force), and Philips (iBrilliance 256). The linear detector was first calibrated for its energy response within typical CT beam quality ranges and compared with an ion chamber and analytical modeling (SPECTRA and TASMIP). A geometrical calibration process was developed to determine key parameters including the distance from the focal spot to the linear detector, the angular increment of the gantry at each data sampling, the location of the central x‐ray on the linear detector, and the angular response of the detector pixel. Measurements were performed under axial‐scan modes for most representative bow‐tie filters and kV selections from each scanner. Bow‐tie profiles were determined by re‐binning the measured rotational data with an angular accuracy of 0.1 degree using the calibrated geometrical parameters. Results: The linear detector demonstrated an energy response as a solid state detector, which is close to the CT imaging detector. The geometrical calibration was proven to be sufficiently accurate (< 1mm in error for distances >550 mm) and the bow‐tie profiles measured from rotational mode matched closely to those from the gantry‐stationary mode. Accurate profiles were determined for a total of 21 bow‐tie filters and 83 filter/kV combinations from the abovementioned scanner models. Conclusion: A new improved approach of CT bow‐tie measurement was proposed and accurate bow‐tie profiles were provided for a broad list of CT scanner models.