The new technology may be used to help identify and characterize tumors, plaques, or vessels that are smaller than half a millimeter. For many patients, finding a tumor that size may make a difference in identifying if it is benign or could be cancerous.

The technology may help to more accurately identify soft tissues such as proteins, tendons or collagen which are hard to differentiate with current equipment.

As cutting edge as photon counting CT scanners are, they have been a research topic for several years. In the November 2011 edition of GE Healthcare's CT Clarity magazine, Dr. Tibor Duliskovich said the technology counts individual X-ray photons hitting the surface of a single photosite of the detector — "essentially, detecting individual events on a nanosecond scale."

Through a cooperative research and development agreement with the manufacturer, Siemens Healthcare, and other researchers, the NIH is hoping to optimize the usage of photon-counting detector CT so it can someday benefit patients around the globe.


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