title: Photon backscattering tissue characterization by energy dispersive spectroscopy evaluations.
abstract: Techniques for in vivo tissue characterization based on scattered photons have usually been confined to evaluating coherent and Compton peaks. However, information can also be obtained from the energy analysis of the Compton scattered distribution. This paper looks at the extension of a technique validated by the authors for characterizing tissues composed of low-atomic-number elements. To this end, an EDXRS (energy dispersive x-ray spectrometry) computer simulation procedure was performed and applied to test the validity of a figure of merit able to characterize binary compounds. This figure of merit is based on the photon fluence values in a restricted energy interval of the measured distribution of incoherently scattered photons. After careful experimental tests with 59.54 keV incident photons at scattering angles down to 60degrees, the simulation procedure was applied to quasi-monochromatic and polychromatic high-radiance sources. The results show that the characterization by the figure of merit, which operates satisfactorily with monochromatic sources, is unsatisfactory in the latter cases, which seem to favour a different parameter for compound characterization.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Ferrara, Italy.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Tartari
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Casnati
authors.forename: J E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Fernandez
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Felsteiner
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Baraldi
mesh_terms: D003198:Computer Simulation; D006801:Humans; D009010:Monte Carlo Method; D019047:Phantoms, Imaging; D017785:Photons; D012542:Scattering, Radiation; D013053:Spectrophotometry; D014867:Water; D014965:X-Rays
chemical_list: D014867:Water