Method and apparatus for partial volume identification from photon-counting macro-pixel measurements

An X-ray imaging apparatus, comprising:

• an X-ray source configured to radiate X-rays through an object space configured to accommodate an object or subject to be imaged;
• a plurality of detector elements arranged across the object space and opposite to the X-ray source, the plurality of detector elements being configured to detect the X-rays from the X-ray source, and the plurality of detector elements configured to generate projection data representing counts of the X-rays resolved according to energy bins;
• and
• first circuitry configured to
• combine, for each macro-pixel corresponding to a respective grouping of detector elements of the plurality of detector elements, the projection data corresponding to each macro-pixel to generate another projection data,
• perform material decomposition, for each macro-pixel, on the another projection data to generate material-decomposed projection data,
• select, for partial-volume-error (PVE) correction, macro-pixels for which the material decomposition fails to converge below a predefined threshold, and
• perform the PVE correction on the selected macro-pixels to generate corrected material-decomposed projection data;
• and
• second circuitry configured to
• obtain the corrected material-decomposed projection data, and
• reconstruct material-component images from the corrected material-decomposed projection data.

An imaging method, comprising:

• obtaining projection data representing an intensity of radiation detected at a plurality of detector elements,
• combining, for each macro-pixel corresponding to a respective grouping of detector elements of the plurality of detector elements, the projection data corresponding to each macro-pixel to generate another projection data,
• performing material decomposition, for each macro-pixel, on the another projection data to generate material-decomposed projection data,
• selecting, for partial-volume-error (PVE) correction, macro-pixels for which the material decomposition fails to converge below a predefined threshold,
• performing the PVE correction on the selected macro-pixels to generate corrected material-decomposed projection data, and
• reconstructing material-component images from the corrected material-decomposed projection data.