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The imaging performance of a new direct digital radiographic detector based on amorphous selenium and amorphous silicon TFT array which is under development is discussed. Progress has been made on the development of a multilayer digital x-ray detector panel with a structure consisting of a thin-film transistor pixel array, selenium x-ray photoconductor, dielectric layer and top electrode. An electronic system allows the rapid readout of image data which produces high resolution and wide dynamic range images. Using a straight edge, small wires and low contrast small holes targets, we have studied the spatial resolution, contrast detectability, and dynamic range of this new detector. Digital signals obtained from each pixel of this detector are almost linear with the total x-ray energy absorbed within the pixel area over a wide range of x-ray exposures. The resultant wide dynamic range allows extended latitude of exposure conditions and the enhancement or emphasis of different gray level regions from a single set of image data. For example, from one single exposure of the head, the soft tissue of the nose, detail structure of the teeth, as well as the bone structure of the neck can be examined by displaying and emphasizing selective gray levels of the image data. Image information obtained from this detector appears to be more evenly distributed over a wide dynamic range which is different from digital data obtained from other digital modalities such as the electrometer sensing of discharged potentials on photoconductors or from film digitization. Examples of images are shown. The discrete pixel structure of this detector and the higher intrinsic spatial resolution of selenium combine to produce image sharpness greater than those produced from digital detectors of similar pixel pitch using indirect conversion method or from digitizing film-screen images. The applicability of mathematical tools, such as the MTF which was developed primarily for analog images on a continuous imaging medium, is discussed with respect to our new discrete element detector.
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