X-ray linescan data acquisition

May 2004 Data Acquisition & Telemetry Surveillance Logistics (Industry)

Electron Tubes has introduced XDAS, a modular system of boards for use in any X-ray linescan application. Each board has 64 or 128 detector channels corresponding to a detector pitch of 1,6 or 0,8 mm. Up to 63 boards can be connected in series to provide a detector with up to 8064 channels. Detectors can be butted end-to-end to provide a continuous array. The first board in the system automatically acts as the master board ensuring that all boards in the system are synchronised. The master board transmits the image data from all boards to the host CPU via the differential data link.

Data output is in 16-bit format. The system can be interfaced to a PC via a parallel port, a PCI-7300A data I/O card or a standard frame grabber card. X-rays are detected using a scintillator and photodiode array. Scintillators such as phosphor strip, CsI(TI) or CdWO4, are offered to cover the energy range 30 to 450 keV. The XDAS sensor can acquire a single line of data in a minimum time of 10 µs. Readout rate is dependent on the number of modules in a system.

The maximum charge that can be collected per cycle depends on the choice of the storage capacitors, one per channel, which are internal to the microcircuit. These can be set to 2 or 10 pF. High linearity is maintained with a charge storage of 3 or 15 pC per cycle.

If a higher dynamic range is required, a 24-bit image data store facility for sub-sampling and data summation is incorporated on-board. It has the ability to acquire and store up to 256 sub-samples. When data is ready for transmission, the most significant 16 bits are transmitted via the parallel interface to the host CPU. Operation is controlled by a gate array, and user settings are transmitted via an RS485 interface and stored in non-volatile RAM such that on switch-on, the system is initiated in the last mode use.

XDAS is suitable for applications in security, food inspection, thickness measurement, bone densitometry and non-destructive testing.

For more information contact Mauritz van Niekerk, OEN Enterprises, 011 675 4447, [email protected], www.oenenterprises.co.za

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