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In two dimensions, we consider the problem of inversion of the attenuated X X -ray transform of a compactly supported function from data restricted to lines leaning on a given arc. We provide a method to reconstruct the function on the convex hull of this arc. The attenuation is assumed known. The method of proof uses the Hilbert transform associated with A A -analytic functions in the sense of Bukhgeim. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We study an inverse problem where an unknown radiating source is observed with collimated detectors along a single line and the medium has a known attenuation. The research is motivated by applications in SPECT and beam hardening. If measurements are carried out with frequencies ranging in an open set, we show that the source density is uniquely determined by these measurements up to averaging over levelsets of the integrated attenuation. This leads to a generalized Laplace transform. We also discuss some numerical approaches and demonstrate the results with several examples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The measurement of flow obtained using continuous wave Doppler ultrasound is formulated as a directional projection of a flow vector field. When a continuous ultrasound wave bounces against a flowing particle, a signal is backscattered. This signal obtains a Doppler frequency shift proportional to the speed of the particle along the ultrasound beam. This occurs for each particle along the beam, giving rise to a Doppler velocity spectrum. The first moment of the spectrum provides the directional projection of the flow along the ultrasound beam. Signals reflected from points further away from the detector will have lower amplitude than signals reflected from points closer to the detector. The effect is very much akin to that modeled by the attenuated Radon transform in emission computed tomography. A least-squares method was adopted to reconstruct a 2D vector field from directional projection measurements. Attenuated projections of only the longitudinal projections of the vector field were simulated. The components of the vector field were reconstructed using the gradient algorithm to minimize a least-squares criterion. This result was compared with the reconstruction of longitudinal projections of the vector field without attenuation. If attenuation is known, the algorithm was able to accurately reconstruct both components of the full vector field from only one set of directional projection measurements. A better reconstruction was obtained with attenuation than without attenuation implying that attenuation provides important information for the reconstruction of flow vector fields. This confirms previous work where we showed that knowledge of the attenuation distribution helps in the reconstruction of MRI diffusion tensor fields from fewer than the required measurements. In the application of ultrasound the attenuation distribution is obtained with pulse wave transmission computed tomography and flow information is obtained with continuous wave Doppler.

We consider the two dimensional quantitative imaging problem of recovering a radiative source inside an absorbing and scattering medium from knowledge of the outgoing radiation measured at the boundary. The medium has an anisotropic scattering property that is neither negligible nor large enough for the diffusion approximation to hold. We present the numerical realization of the authors' recently proposed reconstruction method. For scattering kernels of finite Fourier content in the angular variable, the solution is exact. The feasibility of the proposed algorithms is demonstrated in several numerical experiments, including simulated scenarios for parameters meaningful in optical molecular imaging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Noise-weighted FBP (filtered backprojection) algorithm and Bayesian FBP algorithm were developed recently for un-attenuated Radon transform, which have applications in x-ray CT (computed tomography). This paper extends the noise-weighted FBP algorithm to the case of uniformly attenuated Radon transform, and this extended FBP algorithm can be applied in uniformly attenuated SPECT (single photon emission computed tomography). Computer simulations and experimental data demonstrate that the proposed FBP algorithm has similar noise control capability as the iterative ML-EM (maximum likelihood expectation maximization) algorithm. In practice, the attenuator is rarely uniform. A stable FBP algorithm must be developed for non-uniform attenuators before the FBP algorithm can be applied in clinics when attenuation correction is required. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, we study the inverse problem reconstruction approach for parallel-beam projection in-scheme short-scan SPECT image and obtain approximate reconstruction algorithms if the attenuation is real constant and complex-valued angle-dependent cases and the parallel-beam projection data functions are acquired from-scheme short-scan single-photon emission computed tomography. Finally, we also give an numerical implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expectation maximization (EM) algorithm for the maximum likelihood (ML) image reconstruction criterion generates severe checkerboard artifacts in the presence of noise. A classical remedy is to impose an a priori constraint for a penalized ML or maximum a posteriori probability solution. The penalty reduces the checkerboard artifacts and also introduces uncertainty because a priori information is usually unknown in clinic. Recent theoretical investigation reveals that the noise can be divided into two components: one is called null-space noise and the other is range-space noise. The null-space noise can be numerically estimated using filtered backprojection (FBP) algorithm. By the FBP algorithm, the null-space noise annihilates in the reconstruction while the range-space noise propagates into the reconstructed image. The aim of this work is to investigate the relation between the null-space noise and the checkerboard artifacts in the ML-EM reconstruction from noisy projection data. Our study suggests that removing the null-space noise from the projection data could improve the signal-to-noise ratio of the projection data and, therefore, reduce the checkerboard artifacts in the ML-EM reconstructed images. This study reveals an in-depth understanding of the different noise propagations in analytical and iterative image reconstructions, which may be useful to single photon emission computed tomography, where the noise has been a major factor for image degradation. The reduction of the ML-EM checkerboard artifacts by removing the null-space noise avoids the uncertainty of using a priori penalty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes an iterative technique to reconstruct the source term in transport equations, which account for scattering effects, from boundary measurements. In the two-dimensional setting, the full outgoing distribution in the phase space (position and direction) needs to be measured. In three space dimensions, we show that measurements for angles that are orthogonal to a given direction are sufficient. In both cases, the derivation is based on a perturbation of the inversion of the two-dimensional attenuated Radon transform and requires that (the anisotropic part of) scattering be sufficiently small. We present an explicit iterative procedure, which converges to the source term we want to reconstruct. Applications of the inversion procedure include optical molecular imaging, an increasingly popular medical imaging modality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We describe the continuous and discrete mathematical models for Emission Computed Tomography (ECT) and the need for attenuation correction. Then we analyse the problem of retrieving the attenuation directly from the emission data, nonuniqueness and its consequences. We present the existing and new approaches for solving the problem. Methods are compared and illustrated by numerical simulations. The presentation focuses on Positron Emission Tomography, but we also discuss the extensions to Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates an accurate reconstruction method to invert the attenuated Radon transform in nonparallel beam (NPB) geometries. The reconstruction method contains three major steps: 1) performing one-dimensional phase-shift rebinning; 2) implementing nonuniform Hilbert transform; and 3) applying Novikov's explicit inversion formula. The method seems to be adaptive to different settings of fan-beam geometry from very long to very short focal lengths without sacrificing reconstruction accuracy. Compared to the conventional bilinear rebinning technique, the presented method showed a better spatial resolution, as measured by modulation transfer function. Numerical experiments demonstrated its computational efficiency and stability to different levels of Poisson noise. Even with complicated geometries such as varying focal-length and asymmetrical fan-beam collimation, the presented method achieved nearly the same reconstruction quality of parallel-beam geometry. This effort can facilitate quantitative reconstruction of single photon emission computed tomography for cardiac imaging, which may need NPB collimation geometries and require high computational efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We study the inversion of weighted Radon transforms in two dimensions, Rρƒ(L)=ƒL =ƒ(·), where the weight function ρ(L, x), L a line and x ∈ L, has a special form. It was an important breakthrough when R.G. Novikov recently gave an explicit formula for the inverse of Rρ when ρ has the form(1.2); in this case Rρ is called the attenuated Radon transform. Here we prove similar results for a somewhat larger class of ρ using completely different and quite elementary methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on a two-dimensional (2-D) Fourier analysis of the attenuated Radon transform and a 2-D version of the Shannon sampling theorem,we investigate the problem of resolution in dynamic emission tomography. As a result we provide guidelines on how to acquire and on how to filter the projection data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present the attenuated spline reconstruction technique (aSRT) which provides an innovative algorithm for single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) image reconstruction. aSRT is based on an analytic formula of the inverse attenuated Radon transform. It involves the computation of the Hilbert transforms of the linear attenuation function and of two sinusoidal functions of the so-called attenuated sinogram These computations are achieved by employing the attenuation information provided by computed tomography (CT) scans and by utilizing custom-made cubic spline interpolation. The purpose of this work is: (i) to present the mathematics of aSRT, (ii) to reconstruct simulated and real SPECT/CT data using aSRT and (iii) to evaluate aSRT by comparing it to filtered backprojection (FBP) and to ordered subsets expectation minimization (OSEM) reconstruction algorithms. Simulation studies were performed by using an image quality phantom and an appropriate attenuation map. Reconstructed images were generated for 45, 90 and 180 views over 360 degrees with 20 realizations and involved Poisson noise of three different levels (NL), namely 100% (NL1), 50% (NL2) and 10% (NL3) of the total counts, respectively. Moreover, real attenuated SPECT sinograms were reconstructed from a real study of a Jaszczak phantom, as well as from a real clinical myocardial SPECT/CT study. Comparisons between aSRT, FBP and OSEM reconstructions were performed using contrast, bias and image roughness. The results suggest that aSRT can efficiently produce accurate attenuation-corrected reconstructions for simulated and real phantoms, as well as for clinical data. In particular, in the case of the clinical myocardial study, aSRT produced reconstructions with higher cold contrast than both FBP and OSEM. aSRT, by incorporating the attenuation correction within itself, may provide an improved alternative to FBP. This is particularly promising for 'cold' regions as those occurring in myocardial ischaemia., (© 2018 The Author(s).)