Recent micro-CT scanner developments at UGCT

Manuel Dierick*, Denis Van Loo, Bert Masschaele, Jan Van Den Bulcke, Joris Van Acker, Veerle Cnudde, Luc Van Hoorebeke

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

This paper describes two X-ray micro-CT scanners which were recently developed to extend the experimental possibilities of microtomography research at the Centre for X-ray Tomography (www.ugct.ugent.be) of the Ghent University (Belgium). The first scanner, called Nanowood, is a wide-range CT scanner with two X-ray sources (160 kVmax) and two detectors, resolving features down to 0.4 μm in small samples, but allowing samples up to 35 cm to be scanned. This is a sample size range of 3 orders of magnitude, making this scanner well suited for imaging multi-scale materials such as wood, stone, etc. Besides the traditional cone-beam acquisition, Nanowood supports helical acquisition, and it can generate images with significant phase-contrast contributions. The second scanner, known as the Environmental micro-CT scanner (EMCT), is a gantry based micro-CT scanner with variable magnification for scanning objects which are not easy to rotate in a standard micro-CT scanner, for example because they are physically connected to external experimental hardware such as sensor wiring, tubing or others. This scanner resolves 5 μm features, covers a field-of-view of about 12 cm wide with an 80 cm vertical travel range. Both scanners will be extensively described and characterized, and their potential will be demonstrated with some key application results.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)35-40
Number of pages6
JournalNuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research, Section B: Beam Interactions with Materials and Atoms
Volume324
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Apr 2014

Funding

The authors would like to acknowledge the financial support of the BOF-UGent ( GOA 01G01008 ) and the project SimForTree of IWT Flanders (Strategic Basic Research – SBO 060032 ). They would also like to acknowledge Charlotte Debbaut and prof. Christophe Casteleyn for the corrosion cast of the human liver and prof. Roger Wagner for the corrosion cast of the mouse kidney.

Keywords

  • 3D analysis
  • Microtomography
  • Nanotomography
  • Reconstruction
  • Scanner design
  • X-ray

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Recent micro-CT scanner developments at UGCT'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this