Development of tomographic imaging systems using carbon-nanotube-based field -emission x -ray sources

Conventional thermionic x-ray sources use hot filament cathodes to generate electrons for x-ray production. The thermionic technology has several inherent limitations such as high operating temperature, slow response time, and difficulty for miniaturization. On the other hand, field emission provides an alternative to generate electrons without all these limitations. The concept of field emission x-ray source has been proposed and tested in the early 1970s. Unfortunately all of the early field emission x-ray systems failed due primarily to the limitations on the electron field emitters. Carbon nanotubes (CNT) have recently emerged as a promising class of electron emissive materials and field emission x-ray source based on CNTs are expected to have significantly improved properties.;We have recently developed a CNT-based field emission micro-focus x-ray source. It shows stable tube current under high operating voltage, extraordinary dynamic imaging capability, and excellent potential for miniaturization. All of these new features make it very attractive for various potential industrial and medical applications. In order to demonstrate its applications, two sets of x-ray imaging systems using this field emission x-ray source were constructed in our lab. One is a micro-computed tomographic (micro-CT) imaging system using a single field emission x-ray source for dynamic radiographic and tomographic imaging applications. It shows great potential for the future development of dynamic micro-CT scanner. The other one is a multi-beam field emission x-ray source with multiple addressable focal spots which can provide scanning x-ray beams without mechanical movement. It can lead to fast data acquisition rates for future tomographic imaging systems with a simplified experimental set-up.