Fourier Analysis of Noise Characteristics in Cone-Beam Microtomography Laboratory Scanners.

Goal: We investigate the signal and noise performance of an x-ray microtomography system that incorporates a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor flat-panel detector as a projection image receptor.

Methods: Signal and noise performance is analyzed in the Fourier domain using modulation-transfer function (MTF), noise-power spectrum (NPS), and noise-equivalent number of quanta (NEQ) with respect to magnification and different convolution kernels for image reconstruction.

Results: Higher magnification provides lower NPS, and thus, higher NEQ performance in the transaxial planes from microtomography. A window function capable of smoothing the ramp filter edge to below one-half of the Nyquist limit results in better performance in terms of NPS and NEQ. The characteristics of convolution kernels do not affect signal and noise performance in longitudinal planes; hence, MTF performance mainly dominates the NEQ performance. The signal and noise performances investigated in this study are demonstrated with images obtained from the contrast phantom and postmortem mouse.

Conclusion: The results of our study could be helpful in developing x-ray microtomography systems based on flat-panel detectors.