893
Views
0
CrossRef citations to date
0
Altmetric
Review Article

Phase-contrast X-ray imaging of breast

, , , , &
Pages 866-884 | Accepted 15 Jun 2010, Published online: 30 Aug 2010
 

Abstract

When an X-ray wave traverses an object, its amplitude and phase change, resulting in attenuation, interference, and refraction, and in phase-contrast X-ray imaging (PCI) these are converted to intensity changes. The relative change of the X-ray phase per unit path length is even orders of magnitude larger than that of the X-ray amplitude, so that the image contrast based on variation of the X-ray phase is potentially much stronger than the contrast based on X-ray amplitude (absorption contrast). An important medical application of PCI methods is soft-tissue imaging, where the absorption contrast is inherently weak. It is shown by in vitro examples that signs of malignant human breast tumor are enhanced in PCI images. Owing to the strong contrast, the radiation dose can be greatly reduced, so that a high-resolution phase-contrast X-ray tomography of the breast is possible with about 1 mGy mean glandular dose. Scattered radiation carries essential information on the atomic and molecular structure of the object, and particularly small-angle X-ray scattering can be used to trace cancer. The imaging methods developed at the synchrotron radiation facilities will become available in the clinical environment with the ongoing development of compact radiation sources, which produce intense X-ray beams of sufficient coherence. Several developments that are under way are described here.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank their co-workers at the University of Helsinki, Helsinki University Central Hospital (HUCH, Helsinki, Finland) and European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF, Grenoble, France). We thank the authors, editors, and publishers (IOP Publishing Ltd, Radiological Society of North America (RSNA), Elsevier, and Springer Science and Business Media) for kind permission to reprint illustrations of previously published results (Figures 3–5 and 7–14 of this article).

Declaration of interest: The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

Reprints and Corporate Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

To request a reprint or corporate permissions for this article, please click on the relevant link below:

Academic Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

Obtain permissions instantly via Rightslink by clicking on the button below:

If you are unable to obtain permissions via Rightslink, please complete and submit this Permissions form. For more information, please visit our Permissions help page.