Striped ratio grids for scatter estimation

Striped ratio grids are a new concept for scatter management in cone-beam CT. These grids are a modification of conventional anti-scatter grids and consist of stripes which alternate between high grid ratio and low grid ratio. Such a grid is related to existing hardware concepts for scatter estimation such as blocker-based methods or primary modulation, but rather than modulating the primary, the striped ratio grid modulates the scatter. The transitions between adjacent stripes can be used to estimate and subtract the remaining scatter. However, these transitions could be contaminated by variation in the primary radiation. We describe a simple nonlinear image processing algorithm to estimate scatter, and proceed to validate the striped ratio grid on experimental data of a pelvic phantom. The striped ratio grid is emulated by combining data from two scans with different grids. Preliminary results are encouraging and show a significant reduction of scatter artifact.

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