Issue 24, 2022

Scintillating thin film design for ultimate high resolution X-ray imaging

Abstract

Thin single crystalline film (SCF) scintillators are essential when performing high resolution X-ray imaging with micron to sub-micron resolution. Especially when high energy X-rays are required for the experiment, the absorption efficiency is reduced considerably due to the limited thickness of the SCF. The absorption efficiency can be maximized by tailoring the SCF to have a high density and effective Z number. However, the quest to find these optimized scintillators is both time consuming and expensive when performing material screening. By combining simulations performed using the Geant4 package with subsequent analytical calculations, we propose an efficient simulation tool. Geant4 simulations predict the spatial distribution of the deposited energy in the SCF and the analytical calculations mimic the blurring introduced by the microscope optics. Using our simulation method, we evaluated the performances of a selection of scintillating screens, extending from state-of-the-art to various potential scintillators for incoming X-rays with energies between 5 and 100 keV. To efficiently evaluate and compare the performance of (potential) scintillators for high resolution X-ray imaging experiments, we propose a figure of merit, which includes the modulation transfer function at 500 lp mm−1 (corresponding to 1 μm features) and the energy deposited in the SCF. Our simulations also demonstrate the crucial role of the substrate for the spatial resolution performance of the device.

Graphical abstract: Scintillating thin film design for ultimate high resolution X-ray imaging

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
29 Mar 2022
Accepted
14 May 2022
First published
16 May 2022
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY-NC license

J. Mater. Chem. C, 2022,10, 9257-9265

Scintillating thin film design for ultimate high resolution X-ray imaging

L. Wollesen, F. Riva, P. Douissard, K. Pauwels, T. Martin and C. Dujardin, J. Mater. Chem. C, 2022, 10, 9257 DOI: 10.1039/D2TC01274J

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications, without requesting further permission from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given and it is not used for commercial purposes.

To request permission to reproduce material from this article in a commercial publication, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party commercial publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements