System and method for acquisition and reconstruction of contrast-enhanced, artifact-reduced CT images

A method of radiographic imaging comprising the steps of:

• acquiring energy discriminating CT data from an ROI, wherein the acquisition of energy discriminating CT data comprises counting a number of detected photons:
• associating each of the photons with a plurality of energy bins;
• determining a material composition breakdown of the ROI from the energy discriminating CT data and based on a photon occupancy of the energy bins;
• applying one or more weightings to the energy discriminating data based on the material composition of the ROI;
• and
• displaying an image of the ROI from the energy discriminating CT data wherein portions of the image are weighted differently based on material composition.

A computer readable storage medium having a computer program stored thereon and representing a set of instructions that when executed by a computer causes the computer to:

• identify material characteristics of an ROI from energy discriminating CT data acquired from the ROI, the energy discriminating CT data comprising photon count data of a number of photons and comprising photon energy data corresponding to the number of photons;
• weight the energy discriminating CT data associated with particular regions of the ROI based on the material characteristics identified in those regions;
• and
• reconstruct an image of the ROI from the weighted energy discriminating CT data.