Abstract
An understanding of the inherent variability in micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) data is essential to tasks such as statistical process control and the validation of radiographic simulation tools. These data present unique challenges to variability analysis due to the relatively low resolution of radiographs, and also due to minor variations from run to run which can result in misalignment or magnification changes between repeated measurements of a sample. Such positioning changes artificially inflate the variability of the data in ways that mask true physical phenomena. We present a novel Bayesian nonparametric regression model that incorporates both additive and multiplicative measurement error in addition to heteroscedasticity to address this problem. We use this model to assess the effects of sample thickness and sample position on measurement variability for an aluminum specimen. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.
Acknowledgments
This work was performed under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Energy by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory under Contract DE-AC52-07NA27344. The experimental data collection and analysis were performed under sponsorship of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Science and Technology Directorate. The authors also thank the Editor, Associate Editor, and referees for their comments and suggestions.