Rotating Scatter Mask for Directional Radiation Detection and Imaging

A radiation imaging system that images distributed and localized sources of radiation from an unknown direction, the radiation imaging system comprising:

• a scatter mask having a pixelated outer surface of tangentially oriented, flat geometric surfaces that are spherically varying in radial dimension from a central position of a central axis by a respective pseudo-random distance that varies between a minimum distance and a maximum distance to provide a particular thickness that corresponds to a discrete amount of attenuation;
• at least one radiation detector that is positioned at the central axis and that detects one or more of gamma radiation and neutron particle radiation;
• a rotation system to rotate the scatter mask around the central axis;
• and
• a controller that is communicatively coupled to the at least one radiation detector and the rotation system and which:
• tracks rotation position of the scatter mask as a function of time,
• receives radiation counts from at least one radiation detector that is positioned at or near the central axis and that detects one or more of gamma radiation and neutron particle radiation,
• generates a rotation-angle dependent detector response curve (DRC) based on the received radiation counts,
• applies one or more of:
• (i) a reconstruction algorithm for one or more distributed radiation source(s);
• and (ii) one or more localized sources based on the tracked rotation position and prior characterization of the detector response for the scatter mask, and
• generates a two-dimensional image that is associated with a relative orientation and distribution of a source of radiation from the measured DRC.