X-ray imaging is an indispensable tool in healthcare. However, conventional medical X-ray detectors are planar, often providing distorted details on non-planar objects (such as organs), even though such details are crucial for diagnosis and therapy. While computed tomography provides 3D details, it requires expensive equipment and significantly longer radiation exposure times and dosages, increasing cancer risk. In this presentation we discuss the development of new hybrid organic-inorganic solution-processed materials and low-cost manufacturing methods to enable arbitrarily-shaped scintillators for conformal X-ray imaging. Compared to planar scintillators, conformal X-ray imaging with these 3D scintillators provides more accurate details on the shape, location, and dimensions of non-planar objects. The developed approaches provide a platform for realizing personalized conformal medical imaging procedures.
Professor, Material Science and Engineering