Improving light collection efficiency using partitioned light guide on pixelated scintillator-based γ-ray imager

When gamma-camera sensor modules, which are key components of radiation imagers, are derived from the coupling between scintillators and photosensors, the light collection efficiency is an important factor in determining the effectiveness with which the instrument can identify nuclides via their derived gamma-ray spectra. If the pixel area of the scintillator is larger than the pixel area of the photosensor, light loss and cross-talk between pixels of the photosensor can result in information loss, thereby degrading the precision of the energy estimate and the accuracy of the position-of-interaction determination derived from each active pixel in a coded-aperture based gamma camera. Here we present two methods to overcome the information loss associated with the loss of photons created by scintillation pixels that are coupled to an associated silicon photomultiplier pixel. Specifically, we detail the use of either: (1) light guides, or (2) scintillation pixel areas that match the area of the SiPM pixel. Compared with scintillator/SiPM couplings that have slightly mismatched intercept areas, the experimental results show that both methods substantially improve both the energy and spatial resolution by increasing light collection efficiency, but in terms of the image sensitivity and image quality, only slight improvements are accrued.