New Rx camera: 3D images, minimal radiation

Seeing the inside of the human body in three dimensions with minimal doses of ionizing radiation is what an innovative technology under development at the Institute of Plasmas and Nuclear Fusion of the Instituto Superior Técnico (IPFN-IST) will allow.

Six European research centers and a high value-added company make up the consortium of the project coordinated by Marta Fajardo, FCT Researcher at IPFN-IST. VOXEL is one of the 26 Horizon 2020 FET (Future and Emerging Technologies) projects selected for funding, out of 643 proposals received in the last edition of the Call The project has received 3.99 million euros in funding, 760,000 of which will go to Portugal.

The technology on which it is based - plenoptic imaging - consists of using a special photographic sensor capable of recording the image and the direction of the light rays. This information is then processed to reconstruct an image in depth, going from a pixel (in two dimensions) to a volume element, or voxel (in three dimensions).

Based on this principle, the new x-ray camera will represent an alternative to traditional radiography, with multiple potential applications ranging from dental medicine, traumatology and cancer detection to the study of materials. To develop it, the multidisciplinary team includes specialists in metrology, tomography and three-dimensional image reconstruction.

This new technology, says the project's coordinator, Marta Fajardo, "will make it possible to perform images with a lower dose, unlike the technologies currently used, which due to the risk associated with ionizing radiation, are reserved for the most serious cases."