title: IEC 61267: Feasibility of type 1100 aluminium and a copper/aluminium combination for RQA beam qualities.
abstract: In the course of performance acceptance testing, benchmarking or quality control of X-ray imaging systems, it is sometimes necessary to harden the X-ray beam spectrum. IEC 61267 specifies materials and methods to accomplish beam hardening and, unfortunately, requires the use of 99.9% pure aluminium (Alloy 1190) for the RQA beam quality, which is expensive and difficult to obtain. Less expensive and more readily available filters, such as Alloy 1100 (99.0% pure) aluminium and copper/aluminium combinations, have been used clinically to produce RQA series without rigorous scientific investigation to support their use. In this paper, simulation and experimental methods are developed to determine the differences in beam quality using Alloy 1190 and Alloy 1100. Additional simulation investigated copper/aluminium combinations to produce RQA5 and outputs from this simulation are verified with laboratory tests using different filter samples. The results of the study demonstrate that although Alloy 1100 produces a harder beam spectrum compared to Alloy 1190, it is a reasonable substitute. A combination filter of 0.5 mm copper and 2 mm aluminium produced a spectrum closer to that of Alloy 1190 than Alloy 1100 with the added benefits of lower exposures and lower batch variability.
authors.affiliation: Analogic Corporation, 8 Centennial Drive, Peabody, MA 01960, USA; School of Medicine, Health Sciences Centre, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland. Electronic address: dleong@analogic.com.
authors.forename: David L
authors.initials: DL
authors.lastname: Leong
authors.affiliation: School of Medicine, Health Sciences Centre, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland.
authors.forename: Louise
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Rainford
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology, State University of New York at Stony Brook, L-4 Health Science Center, Stony Brook, NY 11794-8460, USA.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.affiliation: Brain and Mind Research Institute, Discipline of Medical Radiation Sciences, Faculty of Health Science, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia.
authors.forename: Patrick C
authors.initials: PC
authors.lastname: Brennan
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D000497:Alloys; D000535:Aluminum / Q000737:chemistry*; D002138:Calibration; D003198:Computer Simulation; D003300:Copper / Q000737:chemistry*; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D008422:Materials Testing; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D011786:Quality Control; D011856:Radiographic Image Enhancement / Q000379:methods*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012984:Software; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed / Q000379:methods*; D014965:X-Rays
chemical_list: D000497:Alloys; D003300:Copper; D000535:Aluminum
keywords: Alloy 1100; Alloy 1190; Beam quality; IEC 61267; RQA