CBCT scatter correction with dual-layer flat-panel detector

Background: Recently, the popularity of dual-layer flat-panel detector (DL-FPD) based dual-energy cone-beam CT (DE-CBCT) imaging has been increasing. However, the image quality of DE-CBCT remains constrained by the Compton scattered X-ray photons. Purpose: The objective of this study is to develop an energy-modulated scatter correction method for DL-FPD based CBCT imaging. Methods: In DL-FPD, a certain portion of the X-ray photons (mainly low-energy primary and scattered photons) passing through the object are captured by the top detector layer, while the remaining X-ray photons (mainly high-energy primary and scattered photons) are collected by the bottom detector layer. Based on the two set of distinct low-energy and high-energy measurements, a linear signal model was approximated for the dual-energy primary and scattered signals on DL-FPD. The distributions of X-ray scatters were quickly estimated using this signal model. Monte Carlo (MC) simulation of a water phantom was conducted to verify this newly developed scatter estimation method. Moreover, physical experiments of water phantom, head phantom, and abdominal phantom were carried out to validate the real performance of this proposed scatter correction method. Results: The MC results showed that the e-Grid method was able to generate scatter distributions close to the ground truth. Moreover, the physical experiments demonstrated that the e-Grid method can greatly reduce the shading artifacts in both low-energy and high-energy CBCT images acquired from DL-FPD. On average, the image non-uniformity (NU) was reduced by over 77% in the low-energy CBCT image and by over 66% in the high-energy CBCT image. A a consequence, the accuracy of the decomposed multi-material bases was substantially improved.