Nikon-UCL Prosperity Partnership on Next-Generation X-Ray Imaging

X射线成像(XRI)在医学和安全领域发挥着基础性作用，在汽车、航空航天、制药工业和一般制造业中发挥着重要作用。文化遗产依赖于XRI，材料科学、生物学和许多其他科学领域也是如此。通过尼康X-Tek Systems(NXTS，尼康在英国的X射线部门)与UCL之间建立的合作，我们正致力于XRI的下一次范式转变。我们的愿景是，这将包括在成像过程中结合相位效应(基于相位的XRI)以及能量分辨(颜色)XRI以及新的数据重建和解释算法。“彩色”XRI可以被视为从黑白到彩色摄影过渡的X射线等价物，这意味着可以从成像样本中获得更广泛的信息。这将提供变革性的解决方案，这些解决方案在工业背景下是可行的，有利于广泛的用户基础，同时也使新的科学成为可能。他们已经完成了静态和动态，原位和手术，体内和体外，总是检测到其他方法看不见的关键特征。通过实验室大小的标准机器提供这项技术将是一场革命，通过多学科的应用带来经济和社会影响，使NXTS成为该领域的商业领先者，并巩固英国的领先研究地位。使用UCL和NXTS团队共同开发的经过实验验证的仿真软件，我们将在实验进行之前对它们进行建模，比较模拟和实验结果，改进模型和设置，直到澄清所有差异，然后才进行下一步。这将使我们能够开发这样的系统：i)我们将所有参数保持在可控范围内，并充分了解它们的影响和影响；ii)我们可以引导设计朝着特定问题的有效解决方案前进。尖端的纳米制造方法(可在伦敦大学学院的光子创新实验室和伦敦纳米技术中心获得)将使光束调制器的开发成为可能，这种调制器允许利用NXTS常规使用的传统X射线源的相位效应。我们将把新技术应用于一系列高影响应用，包括复合材料和添加剂制造工艺和产品的无损检测、生物材料和组织工程器官、数字组织学、改进隐藏爆炸物的检测和法医学。

X-Ray Imaging (XRI) has a fundamental role in medicine and security, and is instrumental in the automotive, aerospace, pharmaceutical industries and in manufacturing in general. Cultural heritage relies on XRI, as do materials science, biology, and many other scientific fields. Through our established collaboration between Nikon X-Tek Systems (NXTS, Nikon's UK based x-ray division) and UCL, we are targeting the next paradigm shift in XRI. Our vision is that this will involve the incorporation of phase effects in the image formation process ("Phase-based" XRI) coupled with energy-resolved ("colour") XRI and new data reconstruction and interpretation algorithms. "Colour" XRI could be seen as the x-ray equivalent of the transition from black and white to colour photography, meaning a much wider spectrum of information can be obtained from the imaged sample. Phase-based XRI enables contrast increases of up to two orders of magnitude, thus allowing the detection of features classically considered "x-ray invisible".Our vision is to marry UCL's world-class research and expertise on phase-based XRI, inverse problems and nanofabrication with NXTS's innovation on scatter analysis, image reconstruction and colour x-ray imaging in order to achieve the next step change in XRI technology, with the UK industrial and academic communities firmly at the centre. This will deliver transformative solutions that are practicable in an industrial context and beneficial to a wide user base, while also enabling new science. Our ambition is to replace conventional attenuation based XRI with energy-resolved, phase-based technology combined with scatter retrieval and novel algorithms in most application areas.At synchrotron facilities, UCL researchers have used phase-based XRI to image rocks, metals, tissues, animals, humans, cells, foams, fabrics, batteries, manufacturing processes, food, and heritage artefacts. They have done this statically and dynamically, in situ and in operando, in vivo and ex vivo, invariably detecting key features that were invisible to other methods. Making this available through standard, lab-size machines would be nothing short of a revolution, leading to economic and societal impact through the multi-disciplinary applications, making NXTS the commercial leader in the field, and cementing UK's leading research status. In our vision this will be strengthen even further by its combination with "colour" imaging, and with new ways of handling scattered radiation such that the "structured" scatter signal leading to additional information is exploited, while the uniform background that limits image contrast and therefore detail visibility is rejected.We will pursue this vision through a combination of modelling and experimental work. Using experimentally validated simulation software developed jointly by the UCL and NXTS teams, we will model experiments before they are carried out, compare simulated and experimental results, refine models and setups until all discrepancies are clarified, and only then proceed to the next step. This will enable us to develop systems where i) we keep all parameters under control and have full understanding of their effects and implications, and ii) we can steer the design towards effective solutions to specific problems. Cutting-edge nanofabrication methods (available at UCL's Photonic Innovations Lab and London Centre for Nanotechnology) will enable the development of beam modulators that allow the exploitation of phase effects with the conventional x-ray sources routinely used by NXTS.We will apply the novel technologies to a range of high-impact applications, including non-destructive testing of composite materials and additive manufacturing processes and products, biomaterials and tissue-engineered organs, digital histology, improved detection of concealed explosives and forensics.